


I'm not scared to be seen

by DragonSlayer2526



Series: This is Me [1]
Category: Black Panther (2018), Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst and Humor, Artist Steve Rogers, Bucky Barnes & Steve Rogers Friendship, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Canon Divergence - No Hydra Takeover, Deaf Clint Barton, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Mutant Politics, Mutant Powers, Mutant Pride, Mutant Registration, Mutants, Older Man/Younger Woman, Polyamory, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Protective Bucky Barnes, Protective Steve Rogers, SHIELD is not HYDRA, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Star Wars References, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Telekinesis, Telepathy, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-29
Updated: 2019-02-23
Packaged: 2019-09-02 01:11:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 12
Words: 34,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16776631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DragonSlayer2526/pseuds/DragonSlayer2526
Summary: Charlotte 'Charlie' James was a seventeen year old mutant that lived with normals, she was one of twelve that was give to human family in an attempt to see if living among them would make them normal or easy to control.There was a law that forbid mutants from having human soulmates and Charlie knew she would never meet hers.At least that's what she had thought until her two friends found a time traveling device lying around outside...





	1. A Blast to the Past

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sebcstianstan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sebcstianstan/gifts), [angel897](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=angel897), [lmdspe3](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lmdspe3/gifts), [Wintersgirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wintersgirl/gifts), [UnknownReaderHasJoined](https://archiveofourown.org/users/UnknownReaderHasJoined/gifts).



> Charlie lives with Peter and his Aunt May btw.
> 
> Each story with Charlie will have a lyric from 'This is Me' from The Greatest Showman.

A high-tech HMUV grinds through an arctic snowstorm, the HMUV stops and two SHIELD men get out. The whipping snow is deafening, they can barely see. The search team leader, a civilian, meets them,  
  
"Listen, for the record, I’m not sure we have the equipment for a job like this." The search team leader said.

"Is the sonar up and running yet?" Shield Lieutenant asked.  
  
"Sure. We’re getting deep ice preliminaries now. Very deep." The Search Team Leader said.  
  
"So? How long before we can start craning it out?" The Shield Tech asked as the team leader.

He stops the Shield Tech, a bit incredulous, "I don’t think you quite understand..." The Search Team Leader points at something. "You guys are going to need one hell of a crane." The two SHIELD men saw a massive wingtip that is jutting from the ice, towering above them like a skyscraper, awestruck. A skull and tentacle logo is just visible through the ice. German words are stenciled ominously below.

The laser burns through, cutting a hole. The metal circle drops, letting in a shaft of light. The two SHIELD operatives rappel down the ropes.  
  
They creep through the frozen, devastated plane. Shattered control screens reflect their flashlights.

The Lieutenant eyes a panel, “GEFAHR. EXPLOSIVSTOFFE.”  
  
He then said into the radio, "This has got to be World War II. But the Luftwaffe didn’t have anything nearly this advanced." He pauses. "Or this big."  
  
"Lieutenant?" The Shield tech asked.  
  
"Hold that, Base." The man said.

The Tech chips at an ice floe, then stops.  
  
"What is it?" The Tech asked.

The lieutenant stares, awed before he said in the radio, "Base, get me a line to the colonel. I don’t care what time it is." He paused again. "This one’s worth waking up for."

He knocks away the last of the ice, revealing a red, white and blue shield.  
  
A snowcat hauls out a huge block of ice. The shield is barely visible inside.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Charlotte, or Charlie as she is mostly called, James threw her Star Wars backpack on the couch as she headed to the fridge to get a drink, she ran a hand through her hair and grimacing when she heard the gross _plop_ of the rotten tomato that got dislodge from the motion as it hit the ground.

"So gross..." She groaned as she grabbed a bottle of water and slammed the door shut, she popped open the cap and took a drink. 

She hated this new rule that was just passed, the government and the jerk Ross wanted to see if young mutants can become normal by living with humans. Despite the fact that most mutants were born to normal humans, like Charlie had been but her mother had been brutally murdered when she was five so her father had raised her up until that damn law was passed. That new law wasn't working and she was getting tired of having stuff thrown at her, getting tired of people blaming her mother for making her a mutant. It seemed like they ignored the biology lesson that the father that the mutant gene came from.

Let's not forget about another dumbass rule that says that mutants can't have human soulmates. Assholes.

Ross really had it out for mutants, did a mutant kick his puppy when he was child or something?

That level of hatred towards mutants wasn't normal.

...Wait, yes it was. Never mind.

Anyways Charlie liked May Parker and her nephew, Peter Parker and Peter's best friend, Ned Leeds, they were nice to her and treated her very well. Peter and Ned were her best friends and they shared the same likes, it also helped that they thought her powers were totally awesome.

Those two always make a lot of Star Wars references with her, especially with Jedi, Sith and the Force.

She caught glimpses of her soulmarks when she tossed the bottle away and went to grab her backpack using her telekinesis with the latter, Aunt May didn't mind her using her powers as long as she promised not to abuse it. Charlie couldn't pick up on their thoughts but that was probably because she had never actually came across them which was fine with her. But she did like her Soul Marks. The Twin marks on the inside of her wrists were both stars, she loved anything that involved space. One was silver with a blue glow that was the one on her right wrist and the other was a red star with a silver glow on her left wrist. They were both normally quiet, the red star felt pain and confusion every once in a while but it had been years since that happened, the last time she had felt him when she was a child living in an orphanage for mutants. The Silver Star didn’t give off any feelings. The guys must have been in a coma or a monk with really good control over their emotions.

Charlie was honestly impressed, she always thought *she* had good control over her emotions. The telepath had to because her emotions were tied with her powers, negative and intense emotions meant violent usage of her powers.

She was on her way to her room, passing Peter's room when she suddenly stopped in front of his door and looked at it. Her head tilting to the side as she 'listened' to the thoughts that was coming from within.

The seventeen year old Telepath choose at that moment to open the door because she didn't like what she was picking up from them.

"What are yo--"

"Watch out, Charlie!!"

Charlie raised her hand, dimly hearing her backpack drop at her feet with a thud, to block the intense white light that seemed to bathe the room, she felt a pulling sensation and then nothing but darkness and the last thing she thought before succumbed to the darkness was that she was going to kill them....

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Ned and Peter stared at the spot where Charlie had been but she was no longer there.

"....."

"....."

They slowly looked at each other and said in unison: "We are so dead!"

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

_**NORWAY, MAY 1942** _

Two partisans race across the cobblestones. An ominous clanking sound fills the air.  
  
**"Go and tell the Keeper! Hurry!"** Erik shouted in Norwegian to Jan.

Jan run. Erik sets a molotov down and checks his rifle. The molotov topples on the cobblestones. The ominous clanking get louder until a huge tank, the Landkruezer, crashes through a building.

Erik pales at the HYDRA logo. He runs, but machine guns cut him down.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Jan races toward the front door of a lonely stone tower.  
  
Jan slams down a huge timber crossbeam, locking the door, **"They have come for it!"**

An old tower keeper rushes downstairs, **"They have before."**

**"Not like this."** Jan stated.

 **"Let them come. They will never find it."** the Tower Keeper said.

The two men turn as the ominous clanking rises outside. The Landkreuzer punches through the wall. Bricks and timber rain down, knocking the keeper back. When the dust subsides, the keeper struggles to his feet, only to find Jan dead amidst the rubble. HYDRA troops pour in, surrounding him.  
  
Outside a modified car pulls up, its hood ornament a Hydra skull. Gleaming jackboots step out onto the cobblestones as well as the black high heels of a woman.  
  
The Hydra soldiers throw the Keeper down in front of the stone sarcophagus in an ornate crypt. The soldiers try but fail to push the massive coffin lid.

 **"Quickly, before he---"** The Hydra Lieutenant shouted in German.

Footsteps could be heard coming towards them. The soldiers snap to attention as a Hydra officer, Johann Schmidt, steps through the rubble. His eyes are sunken, his skin pale and waxy.

"It has taken me a long time to find this place. You should be commended." Johann said as he stands before the tower keeper. "Give me what I want, and you will find the Reich most appreciative."  
  
"I give you nothing." The Tower Keeper said.

A Hydra guard moves to clock the old man, but Schmidt waves him off. He leans over the tower keeper.  
  
"You are a man of great vision. In that, we are much alike." Johann said.  
  
"I am nothing like you." The Tower Keeper retorted.  
  
"Oh, no, no. I don’t suggest that." Schmidt sees his men struggling with the coffin lid. "But what others see as superstition, you and I know to be science. The oldest science."  
  
"What you seek is just a legend." The old man said.  
  
"Then why do you try so hard to hide it?" Johann asked as he strides to the coffin. He heaves the heavy lid aside. It smashes to the floor. Inside, a desiccated corpse is holding a crystal cube. "The Tesseract was the Jewel of Odin’s treasure room." He turns it over in his hand, curious then drips it to the floor where it shatters. "It is not a thing one buries." He lifts the old man by the shoulder, hissing in his ear. "But it is close, yes?"  
  
"I cannot help you." The old man said.  
  
"Bo. But you can help them." Johann said. He turns the old man to see the tank pointing at the town. "You have friends out there. Grandchildren, perhaps. I’ve no need for them to die." Terrified, the tower keeper lets his eyes flick to a wall. Schmidt lets the old man down and shoves him back. He searched the wall, finally landing on the carving of a tree. "Yggdrasil, tree of the world. Guardian of wisdom..." He scans the roots, finally alighting on a serpent. "And fate." He pushes the snake’s eye, releasing wooden box carved like a snake. The old man sags, defeated. Schmidt opens the box. Blue light illuminates his face. He gazes, enraptured. The old man stares, awed. "And the Fuhrer digs for the trinkets in the desert..." He looks over at the old man. "You’ve never seen it, have you?"  
  
"It’s not for the eyes of ordinary men." The Tower Keeper said.  
  
"Exactly." Johann said as he shuts the box. The light disappears. He glances over at the cannon, almost distractedly. "Commence firing."

A soldier calls out and the cannon erupts.

Enraged, the old man lunges but is held back by soldiers.  
  
"Fool. None of us can control that power. You will burn." The old man shouted.  
  
"I already have." Johann draws his luger with dazzling speed. BLAM. The keeper drops. The old man’s blood has spattered Schmidt’s HYDRA lapel pin. His tentacled death’s head is now a red skull.


	2. Dead Boys Walking and Steve

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Peter and Ned will so be getting their asses kicked when she gets back xD
> 
> Thank you, Wintersgirl, for the suggestion that Charlie could Jedi mind trick her clothes into the clothes of WWII time period!

**NEW YORK CITY, JUNE 1943.**

Charlie groans as she slowly regains consciousness, blinking her eyes open slowly before she winced at the bright light and the stench that hit her. The telepath placed her hand on her forehead when she got a piercing headache.

"...You two are so dead." Charlie hissed.

Headaches weren't pleasant for the telepath, hearing voices just made the headache even worse so Charlie shut off her mind to the thoughts around her as slowly stood up, placing her hand on the stone wall beside her. She looked around slowly and noticed that the alley looked weird, like really weird and not at all like any alleys that she had been in before.

And she had been in a lot, thanks to Peter.

Charlie looked up and frowned when she saw the people walking by, taking note of their clothes. The women more so than the men.

Their fashion looked a lot like the fashion of the 19....

"Oh shit..." Charlie muttered before she bent over to grab a newspaper and picked it up, her eyes zeroing on the date.

June 1943.

Then she moved down to the headline and almost fainted.

“ELITE NAZI FORCES OVERRUN NORWEGIAN TOWN.”

Those two idiots found a time traveling device and it sent her back in time! They were so dead when she got back to her own time!

She dropped the newspaper and rubbed her hands over her face, raking her fingers through her hair as she looked up at the sky. Well, she couldn't just stand here and do nothing, she had to leave this alley or else she might attract an unsavory person. She closed her eyes and used her powers to make an illusion of her clothes now matching the time period around her.

Charlie left the alley and headed into 1943 New York City.

**+++++++++++++++++++**

**ENLISTMENT OFFICE, NEW YORK CITY, JUNE 1943.**

A paper screams: “ELITE NAZI FORCES OVERRUN NORWEGIAN TOWN.”  
  
"O’Connell, Michael..." An Army doctor called out.

The paper flaps down, revealing a young man. He stands, wearing only boxer shorts. Dozens of half-dressed recruits read newspapers, waiting for their exam results.

Another paper reads: “U-BOATS TORPEDO SHIP OFF COAST OF VIRGINIA.”  
  
"Kaminsky, Henry..."

Kaminsky stands, tossing his paper aside. He glances at the next newsreader down.

The other paper reads: “NAZIS BURN CZECH VILLAGE TO THE GROUND.”  
  
"Kinda makes you think twice about enlisting, huh?" Henry said

Steve Rogers lowers his paper. He’s frail and small.  
  
"Nope." Steve said.  
  
"Rogers, Steven."

Steve folds the paper and gets to his feet.

**++++++++++++++++++**

Charlie avoided bumping into the shoulders of the people that walked through the sidewalk of New York, she was walking briskly through the city. She had no idea where she was going but she needed to find a way back to her time.

The longer she stayed here, the greater the risk of her accidentally changing time.

She had hidden her marks with her powers, like she had done with her clothes, making it appear that she had bare skin instead of marked. It was just a little alternating of people's minds, basically she was doing a Jedi Mind trick of sorts.

Charlie sighed heavily as she paused on a crosswalk and looked both sides before she crossed the street.

She hoped that Ned and Peter were also trying to figure out how to get her back home to them...

**++++++++++++++++++**

Steve anxiously watches an army doctor scan his file. On Steve's file, a dozen ailments have been checked and a description of his Soul Mark which was a grey circular object with lines on it and it had a smaller circle in the middle on the top of his left wrist. His childhood friend Bucky had the same Mark but it was on his right wrist.  
  
"What did your father die of?" The Doctor asked.  
  
"Mustard gas." Steve said. The doctor looks up. "1918. He was in the 107th Infantry. I was hoping to get assigned to them if..."

Army doctor interrupted him, "And your mother?"  
  
"Few years back, she was a nurse in the TB ward. Got hit, couldn’t shake it." Steve answered. 

Finally, the doctor shakes his head.

"They weren’t weak, Doc; they were fighters. If you just give me a..."

Again the doctor interrupted him, "Sorry, son. You’d be ineligible on your asthma alone."  
  
"You can’t do anything?" Steve asked upset.  
  
"I’m doing it. I’m saving your life." The man said.

The doctor stamps Steve's file: 4F.

**++++++++++++++**

Steve walks out of the recruitment building with a heavy heart and his hands in his pockets. He wasn't looking where he was going and he suddenly collided with something about his size, soft and smelled like granny smith apples.

There was a reflexive grabbing of arms so whoever he had crashed into didn't fall down. 

"I'm so sorry! I wasn't looking where I was going." Steve said as he pulled away from person he had bumped into and froze when he saw a beautiful dame, she looked to be around the age of seventeen.

She was the same height as he was.

Steve waited for the normal reaction that he got from dames who looked like her, they always looked at Bucky and ignored Steve. That was one of his fears about their shared soulmate, would she focus more on Bucky and ignore Steve?

Bucky had done his best to ease Steve's fears, telling him that she would love Steve as well.

But then she did something surprising: she smiled at him, brown eyes fixing on his blue eyes.

"It's okay, neither was I." She said with the same smile on her face.

He released her and stepped back, almost shyly not used to talking to a dame.

"I'm Charlie Anderson." She said at his surprised look, she added. "It's short of Charlotte but my Dad always called me Charlie so it stuck."

"Steve Rogers."

Her smile seemed to widen at the sound of his name.

"It's nice to meet you, Steve...Um, I'm new here and I'm trying to find a movie theater but I seemed to have gotten myself hopelessly lost."

"Where are you from originally?" 

"California."

"You're a long way from home."

Charlie smiled at that, "Yes...yes, I am."

Steve cleared his throat as his cheeks flushed pink and said, "Um...follow me, I was heading to one myself."

Together they walked away, Charlie glanced back and looked back at Steve, "Did you just leave from the recruitment building?"

"Yes."

"Where you recruited?"

"...No, said that I had too many illnesses." Well, the doctor didn't actually say it but he knew what was on his file.

"Don't give up, Steve." Charlie said as she grabbed his hand. "Maybe you'll get your chance."

Steve stared at her in surprise at both the use of his first name and by the fact that she had grabbed his hand willingly. "T-thank you, Charlie." He said finally.

She beamed at him and said, "Now let's go to the movie theater." She gently tugged his hand, not releasing it as they started to walk once again.

Steve couldn't help but wonder if she was his soulmate but that was unlikely, he didn't see any Mark on her wrists where the Marks are always at. The skin there was bare.

And he felt disappointed at that, he would have liked it if she was his and Bucky's soulmate. She wasn't mean to him or ignored him, she treated him like anyone else and looked at him normally too.

He liked the fact that she touched him willingly and without any agenda, of course Bucky wasn't here but it seemed like she wanted to touch him and didn't want anything in return from him expect for him to show her how to get to the theater.

Unbeknownst to him, his companion was starting to pick up on his thoughts now and that told her one thing: He was her Soul Mate, it was a good thing she decided to hid her Marks.

She hadn't wanted to met even one of her Soul Mates, she never expressed interest in them because somehow she had known they would be humans. And there was now a law against a mutant having a human Soul Mate.

Charlie felt his courage and strength, the love for his family, the unwavering loyalty to his friends. He had known great pain and humiliation, but Charlie had never read anyone with such inner strength before. It filled her with wonder. Steve had taken nearly everything life could throw at him and cast it all aside, unafraid. Undaunted. 

Much like how she and her brethren have with the fear and hatred that humans had thrown at them ever since Charles and Erik had revealed themselves back during the Cold War.

Curious for her small Soul Mate, she dove deeper until, at the tail end of it all, came the dizzying feelings a man has for a woman, the youthful hope that she will pay him attention and not ignore him for his friend, the yearning and excitement of being near her, the sparks that fly when he feels her touch. And the desire for much, much more.

And the disappointment that she wasn't his and his friend's Soul Mate, the sadness that she bore no Mark.

She kept her face blank and her emotions on locked down, she had a sneaky suspicion in her gut on who her companion is. The name is familiar but there are a lot of people who either have the same first name or same last name and are not related.

There's no way he is Steve Rogers aka Captain America.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bucky's and Steve's mark is the first Death Star from A New Hope, Sebcstianstan came up with the idea because it symbolizes hope.


	3. Bucky

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Charlie meets Bucky
> 
> Just letting you all know, I will be editing the story as I go so any already submitted chapters will be added to. Don't worry, I will tell you when I do edit them.

_**MOVIE THEATER, NEW YORK CITY** _

On the screen, a swastika flutters on a flag as a newsreel flickers. A column of Nazis stomps down a road.

"As Hitler’s troops continue to ravage Occupied Europe..." The newsreel announcer said.

Steve sits in the audience, watching intently with Charlie at his side. They were sitting straight and not touching each other, clearly nervous about the other though Steve was clearly more so because he had never gone to the movies with a dame before.

Charlie is nervous because she is afraid that she will accidentally lower her guard and he'll feel her emotions. She could feel his nervousness through the Silver Star on her wrist, the Red Star was still silent.  
  
"On the home front, enlistment centers teem with the able-bodied, eager to help our allies." The Newsreel announcer continued to say.

A line of snakes out a recruiting office on the screen.

"They’re just tryin’ to get outa workin’ for a living." A few rows ahead, a man shouts back at the screen. The telepath pressed her lips together on annoyance, there was a jerk in any time period.

 _And monsters too_ , She thought sadly as she looked up at the screen, knowing what was happening in occupied Europe especially to the Jewish and those who didn't fit Hitler's Aryan race.

Her parental grandmother was a young girl during this time but she had remained hidden, thanks to her own mother who kept herself and her child hidden in the English countryside, at least that's what her dad told her.

And according to her father, both his mother and grandmother were mutants and had the same powers as she did. They both had been Class 5 mutants, the strongest of all mutants.

At her side, Steve looks across the aisle, looking at the people that were in the theater with them.

Charlie glanced over as well, her eyes narrowing at the jerk. She was tempted to do something with his mind but didn't want to run the risk of exposing herself, she had caught one of the rare unprotected glimpses from Erik's mind about what had happened to people like them during this time.

They earned the unwanted attention of crazy Nazi doctor named Sebastian Shaw that killed their mother to teach the young mutant how to control their powers.

It was why her great grandmother had hidden herself and daughter away, she had known about Shaw and while they were technically safe in the UK. It didn't mean that there wasn't any spies lurking about, looking for people like them.

The Telepath looks at a young woman that was watching the screen, tears welling. She clearly has a man overseas, Charlie could see memories of him racing through the woman's mind. Across the aisle, a middle-aged Jewish couple looks somber.  
  
"Across the seas, our brave boys are already showing the Axis that the price of freedom is never too high!" The Newsreel announcer said.

Soldiers, some wounded, wave at the camera, their smiles almost convincing.

They will lose smiles when they see the camps, not those soldiers per say but when the news comes, those smiles will fade away.  
  
"Jeez, play the cartoon, already!" The loud jerk shouted again.

Steve sees the woman flinch, he whispers to the man, "Can you keep it down, please?"  
  
"Together with the allied forces, they march toward freedom and liberation for millions of grateful citizens."

A kid pulls his wagon, a hand-drawn sign says SCRAP METAL.

Charlie pressed her lips together in annoyance, her brown eyes narrowing.  
  
"Let ‘em clean up their own mess, the jerks!"

Steve leans over, fuming, he jabs the man in the shoulder, "YOU WANT TO SHUT UP?"

The man slowly rises from his slumped position. He rises and rises, revealing a very large jerk.

Charlie stared up at the man, and to quote her favorite franchise, she has a bad feeling about this...

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

And she had been right to feel that way...

The jerk hammers Steve in the jaw, knocking him into a line of garbage cans. Steve groans and gets back up. Steve’s a natural fighter, bobbing and scoring a kidney punch, but the guy barely feels it. The jerk swings. Steve tries to block with a trash can lid. The jerk yanks away the lid and pounds him again. Steve’s feet lift off the ground. He hits the cement hard. For a moment, Steve lays still. The jerk hovers, panting.

Charlie was watching from the sidelines, she knew how to fight both with and without her powers but Steve didn't know that. He had told her to stay back and let him handle this jerk.

The Telepath wanted to help him but she knew that she couldn't, mutants weren't known yet to the world. Charlie felt the instinct urge to protect her mate, an urge that all mutants had and it wasn't something that was easy to resist. But she had to, she wasn't from his time and he's dead in hers.

So he was better off not knowing who she really was.

The jerk shakes his head.  
  
"You just don’t know when to give up, do you?" The loud jerk said.  
  
Steve wiped his bloody mouth before he said, "I can do this all day."

She doubted it but she had to give it to him, Steve was a scrapper and she was starting to respect him. And it was going to make it hard for her to not develop any sort of deeper feelings for him.

Charlie knew that he was starting to develop feelings for her, she had sensed the emotions and heard his thoughts when they had been walking to the theater earlier.

The jerk knocks Steve back into a pile of garbage. He moves to hit him but someone grabs his arm, stopping Charlie who had been ready to step in and punch the guy herself.  
  
"What’s with all the fighting?" A man's voice asked.

The jerk spins to see a soldier, James "Bucky" Barnes, is standing there. Steve's best friend.

Charlie stared at the newcomer in surprise, he was handsome and taller than she and Steve. She felt the Red Star's anger and worry immediately, she discreetly placed her hand over it and rubbed the area.

So this was her second Soulmate.

Great, now she really need to make sure that either he or Steve didn't feel her emotions. That's going to be rough but she was a Class 5 mutant as well it wasn't impossible, she just has to be very careful with how she uses her powers and not overtax herself.  
  
"Don’t you know there’s a war on?" Bucky asked.

The jerk takes a swing. Bucky slugs him, spins him around, and plants an army boot on his ass. The jerk runs away then Bucky looks down at Steve, getting up from a pile of garbage.  
  
"Sometimes I think you like getting punched." Bucky said.  
  
"I had him on the ropes." Steve said.

Sure, he did but he was impressive with his courage.

As Steve gets up, a folded enlistment form falls from his pocket.

Bucky picks it up to look at it, he unfolds it. "How many times is this?" Bucky asked before he reads it. "And you’re from Paramus now? It’s still illegal to lie on an enlistment form, and seriously, Jersey?" Then he noticed the beautiful dame standing nearby. "Whose this?" He flashed a charming smile towards her.

Charlie struggled not to blush when she saw that smile, that was a panty dropping smile. Like seriously, ohmyGod, how'd any woman resist that smile? She was trying her hardest not to swoon over that smile.

Or turn into a puddle of melted butter.

"Charlie Anderson, it's short for Charlotte but she prefers to be called Charlie." Steve said because Charlie had been struck briefly speechless by his smile. Damn brain. "We sort of crashed into each other outside the enlistment building."

"Hello, doll, James Barnes but you can call me Bucky." Bucky said as he held out his hand towards her.

"It's nice to meet you, Bucky." Charlie said with a smile before she took his hand, shook it then she released it so she could check on Steve. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I would have won in the end." Steve said surprised and pleased.

Charlie sensed Bucky's surprise and happiness as well, then she heard their thoughts and the reason behind it. Apparently other girls had only focused Bucky and ignored Steve because of how he looked and his illnesses. She didn't care about what someone looked like on the outside, all she cared about what was on the inside and knew that Steve was kind-hearted and wanted to help people.

She wiped the blood off the corner of his mouth and said, "Yes and you would have gotten blood all over his nice clothes as well. That would have shown him."

Steve and Bucky laughed at her quip.

Charlie looked at Bucky and said, "Thank you."

"No thanks needed, doll, he's always getting into fights and I have to help him out."

She sensed his worry and concern about Steve, he was a good friend and would probably be a good soulmate if she told them who she was but she resisted that urge. Charlie couldn't change history for her own benefit. 

Steve frowns, finally noticing and taking in Bucky's uniform, "Looks like you got your orders."  
  
"107th ships to England first thing tomorrow." Bucky said. "This is my last night."  
  
"So, what’s the first stop. Church?" Steve asked.

Bucky grins and said, "Yeah...maybe second stop."

They start walking out of the alley with Charlie walking between them.  
  
"Where are we going?" Steve asked Bucky.

He whips out a newspaper and hands it to Steve, across from Charlie and his arm brushed up against her that caused a thrill to go through her but she clamped down on her shields that kept over her emotions from being felt through their Marks, "The future."  
  
Steve opens the paper to see an ad that reads, WORLD EXHIBITION OF TOMORROW. Monorails race around the futuristic buildings. He had angled in a way that Charlie could see it, there's no buildings that look like that in her time but it was amazing about what people always thought what the future would look like.

Then she tensed when she caught Bucky's thoughts but she made sure that her annoyance or jealousy didn't go through their Marks....

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now Charlie can fully hear their thoughts.


	4. Annoying

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I edited chapter 2, thanks for Wintersgirl for a good suggestion.
> 
> I will come back and added more to this, I just don't know what else to add xD

_**WORLD EXPOSITION OF TOMORROW, MIDWAY** _

A monorail speeds over an epic fair. Steve and Bucky walk down the busy midway, Charlie was still walking between them though her arm was linked with Steve's.  
  
"I don’t see what the problem is." Bucky said.

"I don't think you shouldn't have gotten me a date." Steve said.

Bucky looked at Charlie and said, "How was I supposed to know that you found yourself a date already?"

Steve opened his mouth to say something but was interrupted by a feminine voice, "Oh my God, there he is!"

Charlie looked over to see two girls looking at them before they squeal, urging Bucky towards them and Charlie groaned softly from next to Steve.

Was she annoyed at the loud sounds that the girls was making or was she annoyed that her soulmate was with two other girls?

She certainly wasn't jealous, that's for sure.

The girls barely spared her and Steve a second glance, which caused Charlie to bristle because she now knew who Steve was or at least who he would become. She felt so stupid about not recognizing his face or his kind blue eyes.

He was Captain America, an American icon and war hero. He was the leader of the Howling Commandos and Bucky was his second in command who had died sometime during the war, he had fallen off a train.

Charlie had read a lot of documentaries about him on the T.V. and read a lot of books about him and his squad.

Peter may idolize and fanboy over Tony Stark.

Charlie idolized and fangirl over Steve Rogers, she always had a crush on him and Bucky too and to be able to spend time with them was a dream come true. But she will still now tell them who she is.  
  
A crowd gathers by a stage, she sees a sign hanging above the stage STARK INDUSTRIES PRESENTS--drawing Charlie's attention as she stood calmly next to Steve, watching the crowd (and Bucky) as they move around them and to the stage.

Steve buys peanuts with Charlie as Bucky and the girls get in close. On stage, a dashing Howard Stark stands with a 1942 Cadillac. The girls giggle, smitten.

Charlie rolled her eyes, not at all impressed by his charm or looks but she could clearly see where Tony got his womanizing ways from.  
  
"Ladies, you know how hard it can be putting on makeup in a car that’s bouncing like a kangaroo on a trampoline." Howard said.

Steve offers Bonnie a peanut. She looks at them with scorn which earned her a glare from Charlie who didn't like the fact that she was being rude to her soulmate, the other woman quickly looked away when she saw the glare that Charlie was giving her. Her attention soon returned to Howard as she accepted the peanut that Steve offered her with a smile, using her free hand since her arm was still linked around his. Charlie's smile widens when she sees him blush, he was adorable. "What if I told you that in just a few short years, your automobile wouldn’t touch the ground at all?"

Charlie stifled a snort as she ate the peanut. There's was nothing like that in her time.

Flying cars were still considered Science Fiction even in her time.

Stark hits a button. The cadillac rises, leaving its tire on the ground, bulky devices where the wheel should be. The crowd gasps at the sight. Bucky and Steve gape, impressed.

Charlie wasn't at all impressed, she could now see where Tony Stark gets his cocky personality from.  
  
"Ho-ly cow." Bucky said.  
  
"With Stark Gravitic Reversion Technology (patent pending), you’ll be able to do just tha..." There’s a pop and an explosion. The car slams to the stage and Charlie winced at the loudness but a smirk curled her lips. "I did say a few years, didn’t I?"

The audience applauds. As two girls swoons over Howard, Steve looks around, sheepish. Charlie yawns hugely, covering her mouth with her hand. Ugh, she was so bored. He spots something in the distance, Charlie immediately perked up when she sees his attention elsewhere and catching his thoughts. She follows after him, making sure she didn't make too much noise and watching him give his bag of peanuts to a little girl.

Bucky wraps his arm around Connie. "Hey, Steve. What do you say we treat these ladies..." Bucky said as he turns around with his date.

But Steve’s gone as well as Charlie. In his place, a little girl digs eagerly into his bag of peanuts.

**+++++++++++++++**

Steve stares at a mirrored booth in front of the recruiting pavilion, YOU DUTY: TRY IT ON FOR SIZE! with Charlie at his side, staring at him with a sad smile. A burly man stands in front of the mirror. He looks big and heroic in uniform then his girl pulled him away and they walk away. Now Steve steps up. In the mirror, he now wears a G.I. uniform. His disappointed eyes barely see over the collar. He looked down when he felt a comforting weight press against his side and arms wrapped around his, he smiled shyly when he sees Charlie looking at him.

"Thanks, Charlie." Steve said as he placed his hand over hers and squeezed.

"You're welcome, Steve." Charlie said. "I believe in you when no one else does."

Steve just smiled at her, grateful towards her.

Just then, Bucky clamps a hand on his shoulder causing both Steve and Charlie to look at him, surprised. The telepath hadn't even sensed him coming, she was so focused on Steve and his pain that she ignored everything else.

Charlie could see the girls nearby, watching and talking amongst themselves but she wasn't interested in knowing what they were whispering amongst themselves or even thinking.

She didn't want the headache of reading their minds.  
  
"You both are kind of missing the point of a 'date'. Come on, we’re gonna get a chocolate soda." Bucky said, smiling.

Charlie felt more like a third wheel, she had a feeling that Bonnie had been chosen for Steve but the telepath had caught her thoughts when they had first met, she had been relieved of Charlie's presence and that she was with Steve. It meant that she didn't have to be with him, she could be with Bucky.  
  
"You go ahead." Steve said.

Nearby was tired-looking man in his mid50s, listening in on the argument. Charlie's attention was drawn to him because she knew his face and she had heard his thoughts, sensed his interest, she had seen pictures of him before in history class but she looked away from him and back at her two soulmates.

Bucky eyes the recruitment signs, "You’re really gonna do this now?"  
  
"It’s a fair. I’m gonna try my luck." Steve said.  
  
"As who? “Steve from Ohio”? They’ll catch you. Or worse, they’ll actually take you." Bucky said.

Steve looks at Bucky with a grim smile of disappointment, "You don’t think I can do it."

Charlie squeezed his arm, offering comfort and support. She was in danger of falling for him, of losing control and revealing who she was but she found it hard to keep herself at a distance from either one of them.

Though Bucky with the two girls was making it easy for Charlie not to tell him who she was.  
  
"This isn’t some back alley, Steve. It’s a war. Why are you so keen to fight? There’re lots of other important jobs..." Bucky said clearly upset.

"You want me to sit in a factory? Collect scrap metal in my little red wagon while the men are laying down their lives? I can do as well as them and I got no right to do any less." Steve said. "That’s the thing you don’t get, Bucky. It’s not about me."  
  
"Right. ‘Cause you’ve got nothing to prove." Bucky said.

A tense beat passes between them, one that was agitating Charlie and making her uneasy. She could feel their emotions, hear their thoughts and she wanted to ease their pain but once again she resisted her instincts.  
  
"Hey Sarge, we gettin’ sodas?" Bucky's date asked.

Charlie rolled her eyes and moved to stand just behind Steve, away from Bucky.

Stupid dates.  
  
"Yeah. We are." Bucky said as he turned towards the girls with a smile.

Annoyed, Bucky walks toward Connie. Then, he stops, torn. Finally, he turns back to Steve. Bucky holds out his hand. Steve sees his friend’s genuine worry. He shakes his hand.  
  
"Promise me you won’t do anything too stupid before I get back." Bucky said.

"I can’t. You’re taking all the stupid with you." Steve said.  
  
Bucky said affectionately, "You’re a punk."  
  
Steve retorted affectionately, "You’re a jerk."

Bucky looked at Charlie and asked, "You gonna stay here, Doll?"

She barely even glances at him before she looked away, clearly annoyed.

"You upset that Stevie and I were arguing? It's fine, doll, none of our fights last for very long and we don't hold grudges." Bucky said with a smile. "So you gonna say goodbye or continue to ignore me?"

Charlie sighed heavily before she looked at him and offered him her hand. Damn him, he was so charming and made it hard for her to stay mad at him.

Bucky takes her hand with a smile, he releases her and turns to go. He spins as he goes, for a last little wave to both Steve and Charlie.  
  
"Don’t win the war till I get there." Steve said.

And Bucky goes, swooping up Connie under his arm. Steve turns to the tent with Charlie at his side, looking to him silently.

** +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ **

A young doctor rips a blood pressure cuff of Steve’s arm, Charlie was waiting outside the tent.  
  
"You can get dressed." The doctor said a nurse enters and whispers to the doctor, who eyes Steve. "Wait here."  
  
"Am I in trouble?" Steve asked.

Charlie immediately straightens, picking up on the thoughts of the people around her.  
  
"Just wait here." The doctor said before he and the nurse leave. Steve eyes a poster, IT IS ILLEGAL TO FALSIFY YOU ENLISTMENT FORM. ONLY TRAITORS LIE TO THEIR COUNTRY. As Steve scrambles for his shoes, an MP slides open the curtain. Steve looks up at the towering soldier, Charlie is led into the tent and sat down on one of the chairs.  
  
"I’m in trouble." Steve said.

"What gave that away, Steve? The towering soldier?" Charlie asked with a raised eyebrow.

Steve gave her an adorable peeved look that had Charlie smiling at him.

Dr. Erskine enters, wearing a lab coat, looking at a file, "So, you want to go overseas, kill some Nazis? You have a Soul Mark on your left wrist, it's design is very interesting...never seen one like it before. Anyways you haven't yet met your Soul Mate, not unheard of at your age, I'm sure you'll meet her soon."  
  
"Excuse me?" Steve asked.  
  
Dr. Erskine offers his hand to Steve and then to Charlie who was surprised that he even bothered to include her given how men viewed women during this time, "I’m Doctor Abraham Erskine. I represent the Strategic Scientific Reserve."

"Charlie Anderson, sir." 

"Pretty girl." Dr. Erskine said with a smile, he saw her bare wrists but he doesn't say anything, she was grateful to that because she had heard his thoughts and questions about it.

Charlie returned the smile and them then doctor went to shake Steve's hand.  
  
Steve said, shaking hands, "Steve Rogers. Where are you from?"  
  
"Queens. 73rd and Utopia Parkway. And before that, German. This troubles you?" The doctor said.

Steve considers this, then shrugs.  
  
"And where are you from, Mr. Rogers? Is it New Haven, or Paramus, or..." Erskine said as he reads the file. "Five exams. In five different cities..."  
  
"That might not be the right file" Steve said.

"It is not the exams I am interested in. It is the five tries." Erskine said peering at Steve. "You didn’t answer my question. You want to kill Nazis?"  
  
"Is this a test?" Steve asked.  
  
"Yes." Erskine said.  
  
"I don’t like bullies, Doctor. I don’t care where they’re from." Steve answered truthfully.  
  
"There are already plenty of big strapping men in this war. What they need now is maybe the “little guys”, yea?" The doctor asked.  
  
"Maybe. What do you do, exactly?" Steve asked.  
  
"Let’s say I believe there is great potential in every human. It’s just a matter of bringing it to the surface." Erskine lays out Steve’s file, he reaches for a stamp. "I can offer you a chance, only a chance."  
  
"That’s all I’m asking for." Steve said.  
  
"So, really, where is the little guy from?" Erskine asked.  
  
"Brooklyn."

The doctor stamps the file: 1A.

"Can I come?" Charlie asked suddenly, stepping forward.

Both men looked at her, surprised.

She would have laughed at the looks on their faces and the thoughts that just popped into their heads but she was very serious about this.

Charlie eyed the both of them and said, "What I show you next must stay here, it must never leave this tent." Then she closed her eyes and as soon as she does, everything in the tent starts to raise from the ground. Then she lowers the stuff to the ground, placing them back where they were and opened her eyes.

She stifled a laugh when she saw their looks of surprise, she heard their thoughts and felt Steve's surprise.

"I can fight, I can defend myself." Charlie said. "I won't be in the way."

"I have heard rumors about people like you but I never would have thought to have met one in person..." Dr. Erskine said in shock.

Charlie inclined her head and said, "I am risking a lot to expose myself to you but please, promise me that it'll stay between us."

"I promise." The doctor said.

Steve stepped forward and grabbed her hands, "I promise that you're secret is safe with me, Charlie."

Charlie smiled at him before she hugged him tight, she knew that they will take her secret with them to their graves and that made her sad.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

A guardpost stands atop a sheer, cliff face.  
  
"Are you ready, Dr. Zola?" Johann asked.  
  
"My machine requires the most delicate calibration." Zola said. "Forgive me if I seem overcautious."

Johann makes adjustments to a conduit attached to a large battery.  
  
"Are you certain the conductors will withstand the energy surge long enough for the transference?" Johann asked.  
  
"With this...artifact...I am certain of nothing." Zola said. Zola eyes more conduits snaking from the battery to a crude cannon. A small, wooden target awaits. "In fact, I fear this may not work at all."   
  
Schmidt glances at the carved box from Norway on a table.  
  
"Then we have lost only time, Doctor. But if it does work..." Johann said. Ancient tomes spread out around it. A mammoth tree, a snake hidden in its roots. "In a matter of minutes, we might control the power of the gods. Either way..." His eyes flick over another engraving: a glowing cube lays waste to a horde of barbarians. "It is a moment of terrible possibility."

Schmidt then opens the box. Blind light shoots out. Zola secures his sunglasses. Schmidt lifts out an incredibly bright object of pure energy. He rests it in the cradle. A smoked-glass shield drops down, covering the chamber. Schmidt turns a dial. The cube pulses. A gauge marked "ENERGIEN BATTERIE” glows blue, beginning to rise, 20%...40%...60%...But the battery remains cold. Dark.  
  
"We are stable at seventy percent. Well within safety parameters." Zola said.  
  
"I did not come all this way for safety, Doctor." Johann said as he reaches over and turns the dial. 80%...90%...  
  
"At those levels the power may be uncontrollable." Zola said.

Schmidt cranks the dial. 100%. The cube surges otherworldly power bursts from the cube in a burning flash. It floods the conduits, filling the empty battery with blue energy. Just as it appears the battery will burst, the energy flashes in a swirling rush of lighting.

Schmidt and Zola gape as, within the swirling energy, a brief, otherworldly vision forms. Then the vision winks out as a searing beam shoots from the gun vaporizing the target, blasting a hole in the wall beyond. Breathless, Zola looks uneasily to where they saw the vision.  
  
"Did you see..." Zola said.

But Schmidt just stares at the destruction around him. He allows himself a smile.  
  
"Thank you, Doctor. Your designs do not disappoint..." Johann said. The conduits, like wall of the lab, lie in ruins. "Though they may require reinforcement."

Zola takes a reading at a gauge, impressed, "The exchange is stable. Amazing. The energy we’ve just collected could power a battleship. Ten battleships." He pauses. "This will change the war."

Schmidt pours himself a whiskey, hand shaking. He drinks it before he said, "Doctor Zola. This will change the world." 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, what should her codename be? I was thinking Oracle....


	5. A Different Kind of Strength

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Her costume that Howard makes for her later, https://www.deviantart.com/mandogirl22/art/Marrika-Nerys-smuggler-334093770 that's my dA account and that's an old design of a Star Wars OC of mine but still I liked the look of the armor, I decided to use it for Charlie.
> 
> Steve or the doctor don't know that she can read minds, they just know that she can lift things.
> 
> Been also toying with the idea of her mutation to be something similar to the Force, which means she could use all those nifty powers in that series.

_**CAMP LEHIGH-DAY** _

"So you're Doctor Erskine's assistant?"

Charlie slipped into her kitten heels before she turned around to the other woman, who was wearing a British army uniform while the mutant was wearing an American army uniform.

"Yes, Charlie Anderson." 

"Agent Peggy Carter." Peggy said before she looked Charlie up and down, it wasn't dismissive. "You don't look like the science type." That was an insult because it was spot on, Charlie didn't look like the science type.

Because of her looks, many tend overlook her, not believing for a minute that she had the IQ to rival either Tony Stark or Bruce Banner.

"Oh, I know, I have heard that before." Charlie said as she smoothed out the skirt of her uniform. "But I enjoy seeing the look on a man's face when I take him down a peg or two when he realizes that there's a brain behind this pretty face."

Peggy stared at her silently before a slow smile curled her lips, "Yeah, I know the feeling."

Charlie returned the smile, sensing the beginning of a bond starting to form between herself and Peggy.

"Come, Ms. Anderson, let's see the recruits."

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Eleven healthy recruits stand on a practice field of Camp Lehigh. Steve lookings small but determined in army green, Charlie had been whisked away as soon as they had gotten here and he hadn't seen her since until he sees two figures walking towards them, one that was his height.

Charlie.

And she was walking with a pretty woman in a British army uniform.

Though Steve only had eyes for Charlie and couldn't help but notice how nice her legs looked, he couldn't believe that he didn't notice that before. Maybe because he had been so surprised by the fact that she was nice to him that he had ignored it?  
  
The other woman strides up as she said, "Gentlemen, my name is Agent Peggy Carter and this is the doctor's assistant, Charlie Anderson." Charlie smiled and waved, shooting Steve a playful wink. "I will be supervising your induction today." She passes out papers and clipboards. "To begin with, I shall need you to complete this document."

Steve reads it, LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT. Two guys next to him look at each other nervously but Steve’s not fazed as he starts to sign it.

A meaty guy grumbles as he takes his papers, "What’s with the accent, Queen Victoria? I thought I was signing up for the U.S. Army."  
  
"What’s your name, soldier?" Peggy asked.  
  
"Gilmore Hodge, your majesty." Hodge said.

Charlie eyed the man in an unimpressed manner, Gilmore Hodge....and now she's thinking about Gilmore Girls.  
  
"Step forward, Hodge." Peggy said. He does, Charlie knew how this was going to happen thanks to her telepathic abilities and she shifted to get a better look. Peggy indicates where and how he should stand. "Right leg forward, arms like so..."  
  
Hodge asked in a suggestive manner, "We gonna rassle? ‘Cause I got a few moves I know you’ll like."

She comes close, also putting one leg forward as she asked, "Are you familiar with the art of Jiu Jitsu, wherein your opponent’s size and momentum are used against him?"  
  
"No..." Hodge said confused.

Charlie raised her hand to cover a smirk that was forming, the loud mouth jerk had no idea what was coming.

She almost felt sorry for him...  
  
Peggy punches him square in the nose. He drops in a heap, eyes watering, a trickle of blood coming from one nostril.  
  
The British woman said casually, "Neither am I."

The men titter, Steve looks especially pleased while Charlie giggled softly.  
  
A man shouted, "Agent Carter!"

The men leap to attention as man approaches, impressive, all military. Erskine trails behind him.  
  
"Colonel Phillips." Peggy said as she and Charlie snapped to attention.

Erskine had helped provide Charlie with a cover story, she was his assistant. So far Peggy or Philips hadn't really questioned it though Charlie knew that Peggy had taken her under her wing, her age had seemed to call to the older woman's maternal instinct and she wanted to watch out for Erskine's seventeen year old assistant.  
  
"I see you’re breaking in the candidates. That’s good." Colonel Philips said then to Hodge. "You. Get over there in that line and stand at attention until somebody tells you what to do." Hodge scurries back. Phillips stands before the men. "General Patton has said that “wars are fought with weapons and won by men”." Phillips notices the sickly Steve. He scowls at Erskine who just smiles and shrugged his shoulders while Charlie went to stand next to the doctor. "We’re going to win this war because we have the best men... And because they are going to get better. Much better. The Strategic Scientific Reserve is an Allied effort, made up of the best minds in the free world." The Colonel starts to walk in front of the first row of men. "Our goal is to create the finest army in history. But every army starts with one man. By the end of this week, we’re going to choose that man. He’s going to be the first of a new breed of super soldiers. And they are personally going to escort Adolf Hitler to the gates of hell."

**++++++++++++++**

That night, the men are unloading their gear in their barracks. Hodge puts up pin-ups of women.

Steve unpacks a stack of well-worn military books.

"Anyone saw that dame that was standing next to Queen Victoria?" Hodge asked. "Hol-y cow, did she have a nice pair of legs."

Steve clenched his fist and opened his mouth to say something until a voice said, "It's a shame that will be all you'll be doing, Hodge, just looking." The men leapt up and stood at attention when Charlie came striding into the barracks. "Be at ease, men, just coming in to check on you." She stopped next to Steve's bed and picked up one of his books, looking at it before she put it down and turned on her heel to head back at. "Carry on, men."

Steve watched her walk away, thinking that she had probably came in to check on him.

**++++++++++++++++**

Recruits run through an obstacle course. Steve struggles, last. The recruits scramble up a cargo net. Steve's foot gets tangled. Hodge climbs over him, smashing his face. From an observation, Erskine watches as Steve grimaces but hauls himself up.

Charlie is standing next to the doctor with a clipboard in her hand and she pressed her lips together, she really wanted to put that guy in his place but she didn't want to expose herself to more than one person. Two was fine but even that was pushing it.

She really hated that guy....

**+++++++++++++++++**

Peggy checks a stopwatch as the other recruits wait as Steve crawls through the mud beneath a barbed-wire net.  
  
Hodge kicks out a support, the barbed wire falls on Steve.

Charlie is standing next to Peggy and she pressed her lips together once more, Hodge was really testing her patience and her resolve of not revealing who she was to her small soulmate. 

**++++++++++++++++**

Steve struggles to do a push-up, Charlie is on the outskirts of the recruits, pacing as she watched Steve and eyeballs Hodge. Peggy paces as the recruits do calisthenics, she and Charlie had formed a close bond during the months that Steve has been here.  
  
"I guess I just don’t understand the European sense of humor, Doctor." Philips said he and Erskine walk towards them, drawing Charlie's attention to them until she looks away to continue watching Steve, jolting down something on her clipboard every now and again. "You’re not thinking of picking Rogers, are you?"  
  
"I am more than just thinking about it. He is the clear choice." Dr. Erskine said.   
  
"When you invited a ninety-pound asthmatic onto my Army base, I let it slide because I assumed he’d be useful to you. Like a gerbil. I never thought you’d pick him." Philip said as they stop near an open truck, a crate of grenades inside. "You put a needle in that guy’s arm, it’s gonna come out the other side." They watch Steve struggling to do his push-ups. "Look at him! He’s making me cry."  
  
Dr. Erskine stated, "I am searching for qualities beyond the physical."  
  
"Do you know how long it took to set up this project? The groveling I had to do in front of Senator Brandt’s committee?" Philips asked.  
  
"I’m well aware of your efforts." Dr. Erskine said.

Hodge powers through his push-ups.  
  
"Hodge passed every test we gave him. He’s big, he’s fast, and he takes orders. In short, he’s a soldier." Philips said.  
  
"He’s a bully." Erskine stated.

Phillips stares at Erskine a long moment. Then he reaches for the crate in the truck, "You don’t win wars with niceness, Doctor." He grabbed a grenade. "You win them with guts." He pulls the pin and hurls the grenade. "GRENADE!"

It tumbles in the grass, stopping in front of the recruits. Steve’s eyes go wide. Charlie's eyes widen and her body tenses, indiscion going through her. Should she do something that would no doubt reveal her powers to everyone and risk changing history? Granted she had probably changed something when she had revealed her telekinesis part of her mutation but she didn't want Steve to be alone. Or should she stand on the sidelines and watch as history goes on, despite how much pain she'll be in when Steve and Bucky both die without knowing who she was. The rest of the recruits scramble away. Hodge yelps. He throws himself underneath a nearby jeep. Peggy makes for the grenade, but Steve gets there first, throwing himself on it.  
  
"Everybody DOWN!" Steve shouted.

Steve waits for the explosion but nothing happens. After a moment, he opens his eyes, confused, to see Charlie kneeling next to him with a concerned look on her face.

At the truck, Phillips just glares.

Raising her head, Charlie looked at the crate to see that it was labeled: M-56 TRAINING GRENADES - INERT.

Why hadn't she heard the doctor's thoughts? Was it because she had been too focused on Steve's that she had accidentally tuned out everyone else's? That wasn't good, she was getting used to the fact that no one in this time knew what mutants were and she was starting to lower her guard.

She couldn't afford to get sloppy especially if she returns to her own time. 

Erskine smiles at Phillips.

Hodge peeks out from under the jeep, shamed.

Charlie is relieved and amused by the whole event, despite her misgivings about the doctor's method of revealing who would be a good subject for his experiment.

Steve, still splayed over the inert grenade, asked, "Uh...is this a test?"

"He's still skinny." Philips said as he walked off.

The mutant laughed at that and shook her head.

**++++++++++++++++**

Steve sits alone on his bunk. Around him, eleven other bunks lie stripped, their footlockers empty. Dr. Erskine enters, carrying a bottle of Schnapps. Charlie is right behind him, her heels clicking on the floor.

She sits next to Steve and grabbed his hand, holding it.

Steve smiles at her as he placed his hands over his and gives it a squeeze before he removes his hand and looked at the doctor.  
  
"Can’t sleep?" Erskine asked.  
  
"Got the jitters, I guess." Steve answered.  
  
Erskine indicates his bottle, "Me, too. I didn't bring a third glass though, I didn't know that Ms. Anderson will be joining us..."

"It's fine, I don't drink." Charlie said with a smile.

She didn't like how thoughts were when the person was drunk, it gave her a headache.  
  
"Can I ask you a question?" Steve asked the doctor.  
  
"Just one?"  
  
"Why me?"

Erskine considers this then he sighs and pulls up a chair, "I suppose that is the only question that matters." He motions for Steve to grab a couple of water glasses. He holds up the bottle. "Made in Augsburg. My city. So many forget that the first country the Nazis invaded was their own." He adds off Steve’s look. "I don’t excuse what my people have become. After the first war, my people struggled...they felt weak, small. Then Hitler comes with big show, the marching. He finds me. Hears of my work. You, he says, will make us strong. I am not interested. He sends the head of Hydra, his research division. A brilliant scientist named Johann Schmidt. Schmidt was a member of the inner circle, ambitious, obsessed with occult power and Teutonic myth. He and Hitler shared a passion for violence and Wagner." Erskine sees Steve’s black look. Wagner?

Charlie is silent as she listens and she is seeing what the doctor is remembering.

"German operas about war and heroes. Blood and race. Gods afoot upon the earth. Me, I like jazz." Steve smiles. Erskine goes on. "Hitler uses these fantasies to inspire his followers. But Schmidt...he does not believe in fantasy. For him, it is real. He became convinced that a great power had been hidden on earth left here by the gods, waiting to be seized by a superior man. And when he understood what my formula could do, Schmidt could not resist...He had to become that superior man."

Erskine goes silent, he just stares at his hands.  
  
"Did it make him strong?" Steve asked.

Charlie reflexively squeezes Steve's hand when she sees what had became of this Schmidt.  
  
"Yes, but there were other...effects." Erskine replied. "The serum was not ready, but more important, the man...The serum amplifies what is inside. Good becomes great...Bad becomes worse."

Erskine pours schnapps into the two glasses Steve holds as he said, "This is why you were chosen. A strong man, he might lose respect for the power if he has had it all his life. But a weak man knows the value of strength...and compassion."

Charlie nodded in agreement, Erskine had picked the right candidate for this.

Too bad that the doctor won't live long enough to see it. With a sad sigh, Charlie placed her head on his shoulder causing Steve to tense for a second then he relaxed. Poor Steve, he had no idea what to do with women that showed interest in him and she was happy that she was the first.

Erskine smiled at the sight and said, "Your girl is a good judge of character, I don't think she would have followed you here if you weren't."  
  
"Thanks. I think." Steve said, he looked at Charlie with a smile. "Yeah, I kinda figured that."

Charlie smiled and said, "You have shown me this compassion ever since we had first meet, Steve."

Steve smiled widely at that and rested his head on top of hers.

She almost lost her smile when she both felt and heard his growing feelings towards her. Crap, that wasn't good. He thought she wasn't his soulmate and Charlie didn't like the thought of Chosen Mates.

When a human had a mutant soulmate, they can choose their mate that was human. Chosen Mates were despised by some mutants, they were a sign that they had been passed up because of who they were. Charlie never wanted to be passed up for a Chosen Mate, she wanted her soulmates to love her for who she was and not for who they think she is. She didn't want them to fall in love with Charlie Anderson, she wanted them to fall in love with Charlie James.

The Telepath, Telekinesis, proud mutant and Star Wars Nerd, Charlie James.

Steve lifts his head, unwary of her thoughts and emotions as he hands one of the glasses to the doctor.

Erskine chuckles and puts his glasses on, "Whatever happens tomorrow, promise me you’ll stay who you are. Not a perfect soldier..." He taps Steve's chest with one finger, looking into his eyes. "But a good man." 

Steve clinks his glass with Erskine’s as he said, "To the little guys."

They move to drink, but Erskine remembers something and grabs Steve’s glass before he can take a sip.  
  
"What am I doing? You have a procedure tomorrow. No fluids." Erskine said as he takes the glass from Steve.

Charlie shook her head and chuckled, she was surprised that he had even remembered that.  
  
"We’ll drink it after." Steve said.

He pours Steve’s drink into his as he said, "I don’t have procedure tomorrow." He takes a sip. "Is very good. I save you a little."

Steve smiled at that.

"You promise, Doctor?" Charlie asked coyly.

"Yes." The doctor said with a nod and smile.

Charlie smiled and laughed at that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's an attraction between Steve and Charlie but Stevie isn't used to pretty dames talking to him and Charlie is from the future and can't reveal anything.


	6. Goodbye, Doctor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The picture of her costume that Howard made her is in the previous chapter.
> 
> I picked her codename, it's going to be Oracle because Steve, Bucky and the Howling Commandos find out that she can read minds and she uses that ability to help them.

A big bay in the rock. Through the glass, an artist is painting at an easel.

"Sir?" Zola's voice said through the door.

A record spins on a phonograph, playing the overture from Wagner's “DAS REINGOLD”.

Dr. Zola hesitantly enters the office lab and stops.

Humans were truly disgusting.  
  
"Don’t stare, Doctor." Schmidt said.

An artist paints Schmidt's portrait, palette all shades of red.

"Is it something in particular?" Schmidt asked.  
  
"I understand you’ve found him." Zola said.  
  
"See for yourself." Schmidt said as he motioned towards the table.

On the table, Zola finds surveillance shots of Erskine in New York: in a cab, buying a hot dog, being escorted by MP’s and at his side was a seventeen year old girl.

Zola looks up at Johann Schmidt standing silhouetted in front of the window.  
  
"You disapprove." Schmidt said.  
  
"Berlin doesn’t feel this is a proper use of their resources." Zola said.  
  
"And you are now their loyal servant?" Schmidt asked, he waits a beat before adding. "Berlin, if they care, can discuss it with me personally."  
  
"I just don’t see why you need concern yourself. I can’t imagine he’ll succeed..." Zola started to say before he caught himself. "Again."  
  
"His serum is the Allies’ only defense against the power we now possess. If we take it away, our victory is assured." Schmidt said.

Zola nods, resigned as he asked, "Shall I give the order?"  
  
"It’s already been given." Schmidt answered.

Zola smiles tightly and heads for the door.

Schmidt asked, stopping him in his tracks, "Dr. Zola? What do you think?"

Zola glances at the artist, who looks queasy and frightened. Probably because of what he was seeing and painting. The doctor peeks at the painting before he said, looking back at Schmidt, "A masterpiece."

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Kids scramble out of the street as a black sedan passes in Brooklyn. Steve rides with Peggy, staring out at the familiar streets with Charlie is sitting between them, staring ahead.  
  
"I know this neighborhood. I got beat up in that alley...and that vacant lot...and behind that diner." Steve said.

Charlie caught a glimpse of those fights as Steve remembered those beatings, she felt a pang in her heart that he had gone through those alone. Bucky hadn't been able to save him from all of those beatings. The mutant had made sure to keep the wall up to prevent him from feeling her emotions.  
  
Peggy had looked at him and then looked away, "Did you have something against running away?"  
  
"You start running, they’ll never let you stop. You stand up, you push back...they can only tell you “no” for so long, right?" Steve said.

Charlie looked at him before she reached over and placed her hand over his, squeezing it. Steve doesn't look at her as he covered her hand with his other hand  
  
"I know a bit what that’s like. To have every door shut in your face." Peggy said as she looked out the other window.

"Same here." Charlie said, humans would never hire a mutant no matter how intelligent they were.  
  
"Who’d shut a door on you two?" Steve asked in an awkward manner. "I figure guys would be climbing over each other to hold them open."

The Telepath knew that he never spoke to a woman before, his thoughts were practically screaming that as he talked to them. Which was funny because he had been talking to her just fine before, it was adorable how he easily went back to being shy and awkward around women.  
  
"Depends which door you’re trying to go through." Peggy stated.

Charlie nodded in agreement, she understood that while women were allowed to work in her time, there were still sexist jerks that looked down at her whenever she showed them that she had a brain behind her pretty face.  
  
"I guess I don’t know why a beautiful...agent...and lab assistant why would she want to join the army anyhow?" Steve asked. "She could do whatever she wanted."  
  
"You don’t know an awful lot about women, do you?" Peggy asked.

Charlie is stifling her laughter but her shoulders were shaking, really struggling not to let her laughter out.  
  
Steve said, seemingly smooth, "You got me all wrong, Agent Carter. I don’t know anything about women." A beat. "This is probably the longest conversation I’ve ever had with one let alone two, you should have seen me when I first met Charlie."

"He was adorably awkward." Charlie said as she shot Steve a smirk, causing him to blush. She looked away with a smile.

Peggy is laughing, just the teeniest bit.  
  
"I wish I were kidding. Think about it; I don’t have any money, so I can’t take them to dinner. I’m... kinda short. That doesn’t help. Ever. And I don’t dance, so that’s off the table." Steve continued to say. "Going to the movies with Jess was my first being with a woman."

Those women were fools in Charlie's opinion, Steve was kind and handsome in his own way. She was probably the only one who saw passed his exterior and she didn't mind at all.  
  
"You must have at least danced." Peggy said in disbelief.  
  
"Standing on my mom’s feet when I was seven. I don’t know. Asking a girl to dance seemed so terrifying, and then in the last few years it didn’t seem so important. I figure I might as well wait." Steve said.  
  
"For what?" Peggy asked.

He shrugs, looking out the window, "The right partner."

He doesn’t see that this affects Charlie as she turned her head to look at him, she doesn't say anything though. The mutant would not back down from her choice of not telling him or Bucky who she was. The car slows down.  
  
"This is it." Peggy said.

The sedan pulls up to an Antique store that had two bums loll near the entrance and two men in suits stand near a row of cars.

Steve climbs out, confused, "Why did we stop here?"

Charlie followed after Steve, moving carefully so she didn't flash anyone since she was wearing a skirt.

"I’m redecorating." Peggy said as she walked around the car.

** +++++++++++++++++++ **

The bell over the door rings, the antique store owner nods at Peggy, Charlie and Steve. The Telepath was caught off guard by the woman's action towards her, she wasn't used to it nor was she used to not wearing a badge that had 'M' in bold lettering pinned to her.

The M stood for Mutant.

Ross had wanted them to tattoo it on their necks but someone else had suggested that it should be pinnable instead. Not like that was any better but at least Charlie could take it off of her when she got tired of having stuff thrown at her.

And when she was too lazy to use her powers to redirect the stuff back at the people who threw them at her.  
  
"Lovely weather this morning, isn’t it?" The store owner asked.

Charlie was picking up on the woman's thoughts, she was an ally and this was a code.  
  
"Yes, but I always carry an umbrella." Peggy answered.  
  
"I suppose you can’t be too careful." The old woman said.  
  
"Best to be prepared for a shift in the wind." Peggy said.

The code exchanged, the woman presses a button under the counter, where Charlie caught a brief mental flash of a submachine guns hangs hidden. Peggy leads Steve through a door in the back, Charlie follows after him.

Having no choice but to follow him into an area that she really didn't want to follow.

The mutant knew what was going to happen and she couldn't do anything to stop it....

** +++++++++++++++++++ **

They find a marine guarding a huge metal door. As the door whooshes open, the Marine salutes. Charlie stops at the doorway, looking inside and not liking what she was seeing and sensing.

And hearing, all the humans' thoughts were loud. 

"C'mon, Charlie, it's alright." Steve said, giving her a smile.

Charlie slowly walks into the room, she immediately links her arm through his. Steve didn't know why she was acting this way, from the short time that he had known her, he had never seen her behave this way.

He hugs her and said, "It'll be alright, Charlie."

Charlie smiles at him before she nodded her head and returned his hug before they pulled away.  
  
Steve steps out onto a raised platform and gapes, the huge, ultra-modern rebirth lab stretches beneath them, far larger than the store outside. Techs operate machinery, engineers man monitors. A film crew sets up. They all look respectfully at Steve. His eyes alight on the rebirth device. Glittering lenses surround a man-shaped cradle, pneumatic panels fold below. Six vita-ray reactors loom behind. Dr. Erskine scurries about in the center of all prepping. Steve takes it all in, looking over to an observation booth where a group of men gather.

Charlie looked up as well, picking up on the thoughts of the men within before she took a clipboard from a nurse and scanned it before she picked up a pen and started to jolt down notes.

**++++++++++++++++**

Senator Brandt confers with his aides, a man with glasses waits a little behind. Phillips enters and said, "Senator Brandt. Glad you could make it."

The senator smiled and then motioned to the man with the glasses who steps towards the Colonel.  
  
"Fred Clemson, State Department. If this project of yours comes through, we’d like to make sure it’s used for something-" The man with glasses said as he eyes the Senator. "Other than headlines."

Phillips nods, as Brandt peers through the window a the lab who spots Steve and said, "Jeez, somebody get that kid a sandwich.

**+++++++++++++++++**

Charlie paused in her scanning of some paperwork clipped to a clipboard when she picked up on thoughts that were in German but she didn't say anything, she continued to read and jolt down notes. 

Erskine helps Steve onto the device.  
  
"Comfortable?" Erskine asked.

Steve looks small in the outline of a much larger man as he asked, "You save me any of that schnapps?"  
  
Erskine said, wincing, "Not as much as I should have."

Charlie laughed and said, "You can always get some more and share it with him this time."

Smiling at her, Erskine nods to the attendants, who then hook up Steve. He then looks to a man in a suit making adjustments. "How are your levels, Mr. Stark?"

The man steps out from behind the device. Steve blinks, surprised: it's Howard Stark.

Charlie paled when she saw him, a sinking feeling in her gut.  
  
"Coils are at peak, levels are 100%. We may dim half the lights in Brooklyn, but we’re ready. As we’ll ever be." Howard answered.

Steve eyes him warily as he asked, "I saw you at the Expo. Did you ever get that Cadillac in the air?"  
  
"Had her flying three full minutes." Howard answered with a smirk.  
  
"Then what happened?" Steve asked.  
  
"We landed." Howard answered he waited a beat then he added. "Technically."

He pats Steve on the shoulder. Steve isn’t reassured, neither is Charlie and she wonders if Tony had inherited his father's recklessness.

Wait...yes, he did.

Never mind.

Erskine jostles a nervous Peggy as he tries to squeeze past, "Agent Carter, wouldn’t you be more comfortable in the booth?" She gets the hint. She smiles at Steve. Steve smiles back. Peggy then smiles at Charlie who returns it. Erskine pulls down an overhead microphone. He looks to the booth, waiting until Phillips is standing near a speaker. He taps hard on the mic. Phillips winces, holding his ear. Charlie winced, that was like nails on a chalkboard! Ouch! "Ladies and gentlemen, this morning we do not take another step toward annihilation. Today, we take the first step on the path to peace."

**++++++++++++++++**

Brandt watches, skeptical.  
  
"We will begin with a series of micro-injections to the subject’s major muscle groups." The doctor said through the speaker.

Peggy enters and “Clemson” offers her his seat.

**++++++++++++++++++++**

Stark and his older assistants ready the machinery. The engineers check their monitors. An EKG beeps.  
  
"The serum will cause immediate cellular change." Erskine said. "In order to prevent uncontrolled growth, the subject will then be saturated with Vita Rays."

He clicks off the microphone and nods to a nurse. She opens a case, revealing a gleaming aluminum syringe. She taps the needle, pulls back the plunger and injects Steve in the arm. He winces then relaxes.  
  
"That wasn’t so bad." Steve said.  
  
"That was a tetanus shot." Erskine deadpanned.

Charlie chuckled at that, watching the two men.

A panel slides, revealing a carousel of blue vials. Seven tubes of serum stand at the ready. Erskine and the nurse insert six vials into the injectors. Erskine nods at a tech, who deploys the injection pads. They bristle with hundreds of tiny needle tips. They close over Steve, pressing him to the table.  
  
"Beginning serum infusion in five, four, three, two...one." Erskine said as he presses a switch. The injection pads click. Steve jerks as unseen needles deploy. The blue fluid slowly empties from the serum injectors. Steve’s veins swell. His head begins to shake. Erskine hits another button. Padded restraints close in on Steve’s head, holding him still. Steve’s wide eyes glow an intense blue. Finally, the injector vials empty completely. "Now, Mr. Stark."

Stark pulls a lever. The table slowly tilts upright. Steve rises like a rocket ready to launch. The panels unfold. A hood lowers over Steve's head, sealing him inside the Vita chamber. A window frames Steve's face.

Erskine talks into a mic, "Steven, can you hear me?"  
  
Steve quipped on the speaker, "Is it too late to go to the bathroom?"  
  
Erskine said, smiling, "We shall proceed."

Charlie shook her head with a smile and laugh, her mate was funny.

Stark throws a switch. His Vita Ray reactors come online. Finally, Stark turns the power dial. A piercing whine fills the room. On a huge gauge, the needle behind to climb. Steve's face goes tense. Inside the chamber, orange light builds in intensity. Technicians pull on goggles. Peggy crosses her fingers. Charlie shifted when she sensed the wave of pain coming from Steve, both through the Mark and telepathically.

Steve's eyes squeezes tight as the pain grows.

Erskine checks Steve’s vitals. He nods to Stark, who turns the dial higher.

Steve's head snaps back, seizing. The EKG beeps faster and faster. Peggy stands, worried. Her breath fogs the glass.

The glow surges, flooding the window, hiding Steve. The EKG shrieks. A scream echoes from the speaker causing Charlie to jump, barely resisting the urge to slap her hands over her ears and squeeze her eyes close in response to what she was sensing from Steve, his thoughts were starting to run together as was everyone else's. Overwhelming her until she put a mental wall to shield her thoughts but she still felt Steve's emotions through the Mark, she felt his pain and fear. No wonder both Jean and Xavier had warned her about how being telepathic was consider a double edged sword when it involves your Soul Mate, it was basically a overload of all your senses. Erskine rushes to the window, but can’t see in. He barks into the microphone, "Steven? STEVEN?"

Charlie's hand clenched into a fist as she watched, she wanted to help Steve but she was resisting that need.

If she did anything then she could change the future for the worse and she didn't want that to happen. 

Peggy rushes out of the booth and down the stairs, "Shut it down!

The lights get brighter. The viewers shield their eyes.  
  
"MR. STARK, KILL THE REACTORS" Erskine snapped.

Suddenly, everyone in the lab hears, "No..."

Charlie calms down when she hears his voice, cutting through the pain that she was feeling through him.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

In the booth, Brandt and Phillips exchange an amazed look.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

"Don’t..." Steve continued to say while Stark’s hand hovers over the dial. "I can do this."

There was that spirit that drew Charlie to him ever since she had heard about him.

Erskine swallows. With great hesitation, he nods to Stark. Stark gives the dial a final turn. The whine splits the air causing Charlie to flinch but her blue gaze remained on the chamber where her mate was. The vita ray chamber flashes from orange to white. And then it all goes dark. The whine dies as does the EKG. Erskine goes ashen. Stark stares at his and on the dial. Peggy swallows. Even Phillips looks saddened. And then a sound rises: the steady beep of the EKG. The lights rise.

Erskine hurries to the device as he shouted, "Mr. Stark!"

Stark hits a button. The hood and panels retract, releasing a blast of steam. When it clears, Erskine can see a new man hanging in the straps. Muscular, tall, perfect. His head rests against his chest, eyes closed.  


Charlie blinked at the sight of Steve in a very familiar appearance, she made a beeline to the man. She weaved through the humans, eager to greet her mate.

**++++++++++++++++++++**

Everyone gasps and hurries out, except the man with glasses. He opens a cigarette case and flicks a switch. A red light blinks. He snaps it shut and a magnets it to the chair bottom.

**++++++++++++++++++++**

The technicians undo the straps. Steve collapses into Erskine’s arms, the old man staggers as he asked, "Steven?"  
  
"Doctor? Did it...?" Steve asked  
  
Erskine said under the weight, "I think...yes..."  
  
Howard said, helping him, "You did it, Doctor. You really did it."

**++++++++++++++++++++**

The others rush into the lab. Phillips looks to Brandt and asked, "Sorry you got up early now, Senator?"  
  
"I can think of some folks in Berlin who are about to get very nervous." Brandt said.

**++++++++++++++++++++**

Peggy brings Steve his clothes. He puts on his old now much smaller shirt, Charlie noted that the smaller shirt clung to his new body but his new look didn't faze her. She had liked him before the serum because of what was on the inside.  
  
"How do you feel?" Peggy asked.

Steve groggily looks down at her, "Taller..." He pulls on his clothes then he smiles when he spots Charlie. "Told you that it'll be alright."

"Yeah, yeah. Don't rub it in." Charlie said as she crossed her arms over her chest and rolled her eyes, smiling.

He smiled and said, "I won't....you're short."

"Oh ha ha, you're so funny."

Steve laughed as he moved to hug her, wrapping his arms around her. He found that she fit just right against him, like she had been made for him.

The man with glasses enters the lab. Across the room, he spies the remaining tube of unused serum. He flicks open a lighter, revealing a button. Erskine hears the click of the lighter. He turns as he said, "Please, do not smoke in here." Erskine sees the man with glasses. He looks puzzled then it dawns on him who this man was and where he had seen him. "No..."

Kruger pushes the button.

**++++++++++++++++++++**

The cigarette case makes an ominous click.

**++++++++++++++++++++**

The booth explodes, shooting fire and glass into the lab. Phillips shoves Brandt out of the way. Peggy pulls a pistol while Charlie ducks behind something to shield herself, she could have easily stopped the debris but that meant that the future would change. Erskine sees Kruger making for the serum. He bolts to get to it first. Kruger draws a pistol and shoots the old man down.  
  
"NO!" Steve shouted as Erskine flies back, smashing into the machinery. Kruger snatches the last tube and races for the door. Philips pulls a gun, winging Kruger as he escapes. Steve bolts to Erskine, checking his wound. "Doc!" Steve cradles Erskine, who stares through broken glasses. He takes in the result of his efforts. He smiles, weak but proud. He reaches out and taps Steve’s chest. He stops, dead now. Steve stares for a moment, then looks up, filling with quiet rage.  


Charlie runs over and takes off her lab coat, she placed it over him before she looks at Steve and said, "Go, I'll stay with him, Steve."

Steve looked down at her before he nodded his head and left her with the doctor, Charlie watched him leave then she looked at the dead man and thought, _Good bye, Doctor..._

**++++++++++++++++++++**

Kruger bursts out of the rear door, the antique lady pulls her submachine gun but Kruger cuts her down and grabs her gun.  


**++++++++++++++++++++**

Kruger races outside to find the two suited men blocking his way.  
  
"I have it. Get the car! Schnell!" Kruger shouted.

Kruger and his men sprint for Brandt’s motorcad, the two bums draw guns.  
  
One of the undercover bums shouted, "HALT!"

They open fire, nailing one of Kruger’s men. Kruger and his remaining man peel out. The guards fire, blowing out the car’s windows. Kruger fires the submachine gun out the shattered window, killing one of the bums.

**++++++++++++++++++++**

Kruger hits the button on his lighter.

**++++++++++++++++++++**

The motorcade explodes, incinerating the other bum.  


**++++++++++++++++++++**

The windows shatter, showering Peggy with glass.

**++++++++++++++++++++**

Kruger’s car speeds away as Peggy rushes into the street, she draws a bead on the receding car.  
  
The back window shatters. The driver's head smacks into the steering wheel, a bullet in his brain. Kruger hangs on as he careens toward a parked car.

A taxi squeals up, the cab driver runs to Kruger’s driver, "Hey, buddy, are you--"

Kruger hauls himself from the wreck and jumps into the cab.

The cabbie looks up to see his taxi roaring away.

Gun leveled, Peggy advances down the street. Kruger aims the cab at Peggy but she stands her ground, squeezing off shots.

The taxi keeps coming.

Just then, Steve leaps through the flaming wreckage and tackles Peggy out of the way. The cab fishtails around the bend, Peggy shoves at Steve.  
  
"I HAD HIM!" Peggy snapped.  
  
"Sorry!" Steve gets up, but falls again, his new body big and awkward. Furious, he takes off after the cab.

**++++++++++++++++++++**

Kruger skids around a corner. The serum rolls wildly on the seat, he snatches it up and sticks it in his front pocket.  


**++++++++++++++++++++**

Peggy stops a sedan. A man rolls down the window.  
  
"Stay out of the road, there’s some--HEY!" The driver started to say before she yanks him out and gets behind the wheel, peeling out.

**++++++++++++++++++++**

Steve veers down an alley, taking a shortcut. He spots Kruger’s cab racing past the mouth of the alley. Steve pours it on, picking up speed. Steve rockets back onto the street, careening out of control, right toward a show window. Steve crashes through the window, tumbling into the shop. Steve races out the shop door, bare feet pounding the pavement. He passes a speeding car.

Kruger swerves past a parked truck. Pedestrians dive away as the cab veers onto the sidewalk. Steve races between lanes of traffic. Kruger swerves off the sidewalk, smashing a fire hydrant. Steve follows, tearing down the street, right at...  
  
An old man gapes as Steve runs right up his hood, Steve vaults off the car’s roof and lands on the taxi.  
  
Kruger pulls his gun and blasts at Steve who ducks, clinging to the side of the car as they swerve through the streets. A horn blares, Kruger looks to see a truck roaring at him.

Steve sees the same thing as Kruger yanks the wheel and the truck sideswipes the taxi, throwing it into a roll. Kids look over from their ball game to see Steve atop the tumbling cab, riding it like a rolling log. The car crashes to a stop.  
  
Steve struggles to his feet. A bloodied Kruger stumbles out of the wreck, firing.

Across the way, tourists wait in line for the statue of Liberty ferry. They gape.

A bullet kicks the concrete at Steve’s feet and Tennessee moves out the way with a yelp and growl. He picks up the torn-off taxi door, holding it like a shield. One tourist snaps a photo. Kruger fires at Steve the bullets ripping through shield door. Shrapnel tears at Steve but he just keeps coming. Finally, Kruger turns and runs.  
  
Kruger shoves through the pack of waiting tourists.

"Hey, watch it, mister!" A kid shouted.

Kruger grabs the smallest boy, putting a gun to his temple. Steve stops, he locks eyes with the scared, scrawny kid.  
  
Kruger drags the kid to the water. Steve follows. Kruger points the gun at Steve. CLICK. Empty. Kruger hurls the kid in the drink. Steve races to save him. Kruger presses his lighter again. A one-man submarine surfaces. He scrambles down to it. Steve spots the kid, gripping the ladder.  
  
"Go get him! I can swim!" The boy said.

Steve spots the departing minsub, he scowls as he said, "Great. I can’t."  
  
The sub dives, propellers whirring. Kruger pilots beneath the hull of a tramp steamer.  
  
Steve sprints the length of the dock and dives.  
  
Torpedoing into the water. Steve kicks for the sub. Kruger smiles to himself, pleased at his getaway until the sub suddenly lurches. Kruger looks behind him to see Steve holding on to the tailfin. Kruger pushes the stick, diving.

Steve hangs on tight. He punches the cockpit glass, again and again. Steve punches one last time, the glass spiderwebs around his fist. Kruger rages as water pours in.

Steve tugs on the latch, opening the cockpit. He pulls Kruger out and kicks for the surface. The sub plows into the silty river bottom.  
  
Steve throws Kruger to the dock, he glanced quickly up quickly to see that Tennessee was with the boy who had his small arms around around her neck before he looked back at the man. And just in time too because Kruger suddenly whirls around with a knife. Steve kicks him, the knife and the serum go flying. The serum vial smashes on the dock. Kruger watches the blue liquid drip through the cracks. Steve rolls Kruger over, putting a knee in the Nazi’s chest.  
  
"Who the hell are you?" Steve demanded.  
  
"The first of many. Cut off one head..." Kruger presses his tongue against a false tooth. "And two more shall take its place." He bites down on a cyanide pill. "Hail...Hydra..."

Steve’s eyes go wide as Kruger seizes up and dies. Steve looks down at himself, stunned at his new body. He stands alone on the pier, a man transformed. 

Just then, Peggy squeals up in the sedan. She jumps out and runs to Steve, more jeeps full of MP’s screech in.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Charlie looked up when she sense Peggy and Steve return, she had been kneeling next to Erskine since Steve left to chase that man. "Did you...?" She started to ask, Steve looked down in silence but she saw what had happened to the man.

She stood up and walked over to him, hugging him. He returned the hug, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her flushed against him.

The mutant knew that hugs meant something else during this time but he looked so sad, and she felt his sadness and sorrow through his Mark. 

Charlie coul sense Bucky's emotions through his Mark, she knew that he was still alive so she didn't have to worry about him but it didn't mean that she cared less about him. As long as he was still alive than she wouldn't worry about him, right now Steve needed her.

She rubbed his back in a soothing motion.

There were no words to express how she feels about the death of Erskine so she simply held him and comforted him in the way she still would have if he had known who she really was. Expect for that fact that she made sure that he still couldn't sense her emotions. Charlie closed her eyes when he gently squeezed her, fisting her blouse as he clung to her for comfort and support. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Changed it a bit so that Steve is in love with Charlie instead of Peggy, he and Peggy have a more friend relationship...as does Steve and Bucky, sorry.


	7. Lab rat or dancing monkey

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm having Charlie sing the song ^^, if she should ever sing again, it'll be in bold.
> 
> I dunno if you have read the newest chapter for the christmas one but she has a voice similar to Judy Garland's and that includes her singing voice.
> 
> Let me know if you want more Steve/Charlie or Bucky/Charlie scenes! 
> 
> Also how should she return to her own time? And when should she return?
> 
> I changed how Jessica's facial appearance looks like, https://i.pinimg.com/564x/55/1a/af/551aaf6a77b38bb822b07903588f9727.jpg?b=t this is now her but her hair is black.

**SSR WAREHOUSE, OFFICE**

Howard Stark, in overalls and goggles, slowly taking apart the HYDRA minisub.

Steve stares down at him as an SSR doctor and nurse draw blood from his arm, standing next to him was Charlie who was holding his other hand. Peggy watches the both with concern.  
  
"You think you’ve got enough?" Steve asked.

The nurse fills the vial, resting it beside a dozen others.  
  
"All of Dr. Erskine’s research and equipment is gone. Any hope of reproducing the program is locked in your genetic code. But it would take years." Peggy said. "At the moment, you’re the only super soldier there is."

Steve rolls down his sleeve and on the desk, he sees Erskine's shattered glasses.  
  
"Erskine deserved more than that." Steve said.

Charlie leaned forward and pressed her forehead against his bicep, she could feel his sadness and hear his sad thoughts.

"If it could work only once, he’d be proud it was you." Peggy said softly.

The quiet moment lingers, Charlie squeezed his hand before she looked towards the door. She was picking up on the thoughts of Brandt and Phillips.  
  
Stark works as Phillips enters, Brandt and his aide.  
  
"I’m on a number of committees, Colonel." Brandt said.  
  
"Hydra is the Nazi deep science division. It’s led by Dr. Erskine’s first test subject, Johann Schmidt." Peggy explained to the Senator.  
  
Philips looked at her and said, "Hydra’s practically a cult. They worship Schmidt, think he’s invincible."  
  
"So what are you going to do about it?" The Senator asked.  
  
"I spoke to the President this morning. As of today, the SSR’s being re-tasked." Philips stated.  
  
Peggy asked, surprised, "Colonel?"  
  
"We’re taking the fight to Hydra. Pack your bags, Agent. You, too, Stark. The three of us fly to London tonight." Philips said.  
  
"Sir? If you’re going after Schmidt, I want in." Steve said as he got off the table, Charlie having moved away to give him room to be able to do so.  
  
"You’re an experiment. We’re sending you to Alamogordo." Philips said looking at Steve.  
  
"As what, a lab rat? The serum worked!" Steve asked, upset.  
  
"I asked for an army. All I got is you. And you are not enough." Philips stated before he walked off.

Charlie watched him leave, tempted to _trip_ him but she resists that childish use of her powers. She only does it with Flash anyways that jerk deserves it most of the time, actually make that all the time.

He is always bullying Peter and Ned, he tries to bully her but Charlie is no one's victim.

Steve looks sunk, he felt a small, feminine hand slip into his and curl around his now larger hand. He gives her a grateful smile and squeezes her hand, Jessica looks at him and returns it.

Brandt waves his aide over.  
  
"With all due respect, Colonel, I think we may be missing the point. You’ve seen Steve here in action. More importantly, the country’s seen it." Brandt said as his aide hands over a copy of the NEW YORK EXAMINER that has the bold title of NAZI SABOTEUR FOILED! MYSTERY MAN SAVES CIVILIANS! In the photo, Steve deflects gunfire with a starred car door. Very much like the shield that Charlie had seen him with in black and white pictures. "Enlistment lines have been around the block since this hit the newsstands. You don’t take a soldier, a symbol, like this and hide him in a lab."

Steve looks surprised, he didn’t expect Brandt to step up for him.

Charlie doesn't trust him at all, not because she is picking up on his thoughts but because he's a politician and she hates them. They were the ones who passed the Mutant Registration Acts, they were the ones who have been making her and her fellow mutants' lives hard.

General Ross is also to blame but it wasn't just him.

Brandt turns on the charm, becoming the consummate politician, "He needs to be out there, showing the world what the American fighting man is made of." To Steve. "Son, do you want to serve your country? On the most important battlefield in this war?"  
  
"It’s all I want." Steve said, relieved and happy.  
  
"Then congratulations. You just got promoted." Brandt said with a smile.

Steve smiles, Charlie is eyeing the senator with open distaste...

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Steve sweats in the backstage of a small theater, sick to his stomach.  
  
"I don’t know if I can do this." Steve said.

Brandt's aide stands beside him, "Nothing to it. You sell a few bonds, bonds buy a few bullets, bullets kill a few Nazis. Bing bang boom, you’re an American hero."

Steve swallows hard as he said, "Not how I pictured getting there."  
  
"The Senator’s got a lot of pull on the Hill. Play ball with us and you’ll be leading your own platoon in no time." The aide said.

Steve considers this as a bugle plays, he wonders what Charlie is doing right now...

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Charlie is getting ready, putting on her 'outfit' and ignoring how similar it was to outfits from her time. Nice to know nothing really changes when it comes to the clothing of women.

Men were pigs, expect for her father, Ned and Peter.

Oh, and Uncle Ben too.

She looked up when she hears a bugle play, that was her cue...

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

The curtains part. After a long awkward moment, Steven stumbles through the curtains, as if shoved. He wears red boots and gloves, a blue costume with a stars and stripes shirt and a mask with wings. Dancing girls in short skirts look expectant, Charlie was standing in front of a mic also looking at Steve who had way more important things to look at rather than how Charlie looked in a short skirt. She wasn't insulted though, she could sense his nervousness and dismay through his Mark. Steve stares at the small audience, dismayed.

In the crowd, Senator Brandt looks pleased. Steve glances over his shoulder, Brandt’s aide gives him the thumbs up.   
  
Charlie opened her mouth and started to sing, causing Steve to snap his head towards her in surprise (he blushed when he saw her outfit, oh yeah, she really did have nice legs) and the dancing girls started to dance, _"_ **Who’s strong and brave, here to save the American way?"** He had no idea she could even sing like that.

Steve checks the cue card taped inside his triangular shield, he said hesitant, "Who’s fighting to keep you safe at home?"  
  
**"Who vows to fight like a man for what’s right, night and day?"** Charlie crooned out, placing her hands on her hips and swaying her hips lightly as she sang.

"It’s the American soldier, that’s who." Steve said, trying not to shiver as Charlie's voice seemed to caress his skin.  
  
Charlie raised her arms as she sang the next verse, **"Who will campaign door-to-door for America? Carry the flag shore-to-shore for America? From Hoboken to Spokane, The Star-Spangled man with a plan."**   


**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Steve poses for a photo with a crying baby. After the flash, Brandt's aide hands him another baby. A sign reads, TAKE A SNAP WITH CAP!. Now Brandt elbows his way in, throwing his arm around Steve, grinning at the camera.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Steve stands in the center of the stage as dancing girls circle him, waving tiny flags.

Charlie is singing the song, _"_ **Who’s strong and brave, here to save the American way? Who vows to fight like a man for what’s right, night and day? Who will campaign door-to-door for America? Carry the flag shore-to-shore for America? From Hoboken to Spokane, The Star-Spangled man with a plan."**

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Steve marches with the troops on a war-torn battlefield but he’s marching on a treadmill on a movie set in Hollywood.

Charlie is sitting on a chair, watching him with a book on her lap, on the cover is _The Time Machine_.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Steve takes to the mic, confident while Charlie stands a little ways from him with her hands clasped behind her and a smile on her lips. Suddenly, a kid stands up in his seat. Panicked, he points at “Hitler” creeping from the wings. Steve doesn't notice as he says, "But we can’t do it without bullets and bandages. Without tanks and tents. That’s where you come in."

More kids stand now, shouting, "Look out! Behind you!"  
  
"Each bond you buy protects someone you love. So our boys will be armed and ready." Steve continued to say, just then Hitler rushes him. "And so the Germans will think twice before trying to get the drop on us." Steve spins and fake-socks Hitler on the jaw, Charlie does an over the top surprised look with hands going over her red painted lips. The Fuhrer goes down, the audience goes wild. Steve looks out at the adoring fans, soaking it all in.

Charlie smiles widely as she claps along with the audience.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

A stack of Captain America #1's, featuring Cap socking Hitler, lands with a thump on a newsstand. Kids clamor for a copy.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

In a lobby, kids yell for Steve's autograph. Steve was in costume but with the cowl down hands his shield to Brandt's aide, Charlie is standing on the other side of him with friendly and kind smile on her red lips. The aide sags under the weight of the heavy metal slab, Charlie feels no pity for the aide.  
  
"Hey, Cap, my brother says you took out four German tanks all by yourself." A little kid said.  
  
"Sorry, kid. Tell your brother he’s wrong..." Steve said, the kid sags, disappointed. Steve grins. "It was eight German tanks."

Charlie gave a soft chuckle and Steve looks down at her, smiling.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**ITALY, OCTOBER 1943 FIVE MILES FROM THE FRONT.**

Hundreds of battle-hardened GI's stare at the man in the red, white and blue pajamas.  
  
"Okay...I’m going to need a volunteer." Steve said with a smile.  
  
"I already volunteered. How do you think I got here." A soldier said from the crowd.

The crowd laughs. Steve stiffens and Charlie, who is watching from the sidelines, presses her lips together in anger and annoyance. Ugh, they acted like Steve had even wanted to do this! He had wanted to fight alongside them but Philips refused to let him!  
  
"BRING THE GIRLS BACK!" Another soldier shouted.

Nope, no way in hell she was going back on stage!

She had heard the soldiers thoughts about her and the dancing girls, she refused to go back on stage. The other girls can but not her, she was no man's showgirl.

Now if Steve or Bucky wanted a private show...

Charlie slapped her cheek before that thought could take root but a blush certainly had taken root on her cheeks, down hormones! Down! Being around Steve was seriously taking a hit on her hormones...and among another thing.

Like her heart, damn thing won't listen to her brain. It wanted her to tell Steve who she was but her brain knew better, if she did than she could change history for the even worse for mutant kind.

And Charlie was a proud mutant and she refused to harm her brethren even more.   
  
"I think they only know the one song, but...I’ll...see what I can do..." Steve said.  
  
"You do that, sweetheart!" The soldier shouted.

In the crowd, Hodge nudges the GI next to him and asked, "Where do they get these guys?"

The guy next to him shrugs. They boo, the rest of the crown joins in. Steve looks bewildered, trying to keep order.

Charlie sees Hodge, having picked up on his thoughts and narrowed her eyes at him. Oooh, if she didn't care about the outcome she would so mess up his mind!   
  
"Hey, guys, we’re all on the same side" Steve said.

"Hey Captain, sign this for me!" Another soldier shouted before he moons Steve, Charlie made a disgusted face. The GI’s laugh. Somebody throws a tomato, Steve has to block it with his shield. As the chant **_Bring back the girls_** becomes a roar...

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Rain falls, Steve, in an overcoat, sits on the edge of the stage. He sketches a chimp dressed as cap rides a unicycle, he has other drawings in his notebook. They were mostly of Charlie in various poses, they mostly all portrait drawings.

And only one of them was of her in her outfit that she wore on tour with him, the majority of them was of her in normal wear when she wasn't singing and wearing that outfit. Not that he didn't think it looked good on her, she wore it well and she had the legs to pull off the short skirt. But he preferred her in her usual wear when she is relaxing or reading a book.  
  
"That was quite a performance." Peggy's voice said from behind him.  
  
Steve turns to see Peggy and Charlie standing there, the latter was wearing a coat over her outfit. Steve knew that she wasn't comfortable about wearing it in front of the soldiers, and to be honest neither was he because he knew what men thought and unlike him those men had no problem treating Charlie like an object. He stands, surprised as he said, "Yeah, I...had to improvise a bit. The crowds I’m used to are usually more...twelve."  
  
"I understand you’re “America’s New Hope"." Peggy said as she moves closer to him, Charlie moves to sit next to him on the stage steps. Making sure her coat didn't move as she sat down, of course she kept a firm hold on it with one hand.

He see his cap suit is exposed. He shuts his coat and sits, "People buy bonds, bonds buy bullets, bullets kill Nazis. Sales rise ten percent in every state I visit."  
  
Peggy eyed Steve and asked, "Is that Senator Brandt I hear?" She noted Charlie's eyeroll and snort.  
  
"Hey, Phillips was going to stick me in a lab. At least Brandt got me here." Steve said.

Charlie rolled her eyes, not in the way that Steve wanted to come here though.   
  
"And are those your only option?" Peggy asked before eyeing his sketch. "Lab rat or dancing monkey? You know you’re meant for more than this."

Charlie silently agreed with Peggy, Steve was meant for so much more than to be a dancing monkey or a lab rat but she knew that he would get his chance. She had felt a change in Bucky's emotions, he was in pain and fearful.

Steve takes this in. Finally he said, "It’s just, you get enough people telling you you’re a hero, after years of them telling you you’re nothing..." He pauses and Charlie reaches over and takes his hand in hers. Peggy smiles at the action, she knew that they had feelings for each other but neither of them acted on it or even said anything about it. She had caught a glimpse of Steve's Soul Mark on his wrist but she had noted the lack of Mark on Charlie's wrists. "All I dreamed about was coming overseas, being on the front lines, serving my country. I finally get everything I wanted...and I’m wearing tights." At least he isn't wearing a short skirt, Charlie mused to herself. She was so going to change when she got back to her tent. Steve looks up, seeing a platoon of tired wounded soldiers. Charlie looks over as well, the pain coming from the wounded drawing her attention away from the sadness of the man next to her. An ambulance rolls up to the hospital tent, corpsmen unload the wounded on stretchers. "Looks like they’ve been through hell."  
  
"These men more than most." Peggy said as she crouched next to Steve and Charlie.

Steve eyes her, understanding as he asked, "Hydra?"  
  
"Not officially." Peggy said.  
  
"Back home, that’s a yes." Steve said.

She considers protocol but leans near him and Charlie instead, "Schmidt was moving a force through Azzano. 200 hundred men went up against them, less than fifty came back. Your audience contained all that’s left of the 107th. The rest were killed or captured."

Charlie stiffened at that, pretending like that was a surprise and she didn't know about that.

Ned and Peter teased her about her love of History but it was allowing her to blend in right now.

And she also knew that there was no way she was going to let Steve go there alone but she also knew that she would be using her powers in front of him and those men. Steve knew about one of her powers, just not the others that she had.  
  
"The 107th?" Steve asked as he straightens.  
  
"Yes, what?" Peggy asked, confused.

He stands pulling Charlie and then her up as well, "Come on." He grabbed Charlie's hand and pulled her after him as Peggy follows after them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Her new costume that Howard will make her and Steve designed for her: https://i.pinimg.com/564x/45/51/3f/45513f5b3d1b20b265d3d25d20237a56.jpg that seemed to fit more with what I was wanting, Charlie wants to blend in a bit.
> 
> My Marvel channel on my Discord account: https://discord.gg/jPV4raB just let me know who you are.


	8. Captain America

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There'll be three versions of Charlie with the Avengers as her soulmates plus Storm and T'Challa, one will be set after the movies but be canon divergence.
> 
> Remember during the time when Cap is fight Hydra with the Howling Commandos, I will be taking requests for scenes between Charlie and her two soulmates but please remember that Steve and Bucky are just friends!
> 
> Also please remind me that this is a soulmate AU xD

**U.S. CAMP, PHILLIPS’ TENT - LATE AFTERNOON**

A Corporal types. At a desk across the tent, Colonel Phillips signs a stack of letters. Just then, Steve barrels in still holding Charlie's hand with Peggy behind them.  
  
"Well, if it isn’t “the star spangled man with the plan” and his song bird. What is your plan exactly?" Philips asked.

Charlie gave the Colonel a peeved look when he called her that but doesn't say anything.  
  
"Azzano. I want to see the casualty list." Steve said.

Phillips points to the rank insignia on his collar and said, "You don’t get to give me orders, _Captain_."  
  
"I don’t need the whole list. Just one name. Sergeant James Barnes from the 107th." Steve said.  
  
Phillips looked at Peggy and said, "You and I are going to have a conversation later that you won’t enjoy."

"Just tell me if he’s alive, sir. BA-R..." Steve started to say.

"Do not spell at me, son." Phillips snapped.

Peggy sees Steve's resolve and Charlie's worry, she turns to Phillips and said, "Sir, Rogers is only on loan to the USO. Officially, he is still SSR. As is Anderson."

Phillips stares at Steve. Finally, he relents, "Barnes?" Steve nods. Phillips picks up a thick sheaf of letters, leafing through the first few. "I’ve written more letters to more  
mothers than I care to count. I’m sorry. But the name does sound familiar."

Steve pales, Phillips’ words sinking in. Charlie still has a worried look on her face despite the fact that she knew that Bucky is alive (she could feel his pain and fear through his Mark so she knows that he's alive still) and so is the rest of the future members of the Howling Commandos. He stares at a map of Austria on the wall, alongside aerial photos of a facility.  
  
"What about the others? You’re planning a rescue mission?" Steve asked.  
  
"Yeah. It’s called winning the war." Phillips said.  
  
"But if you know where they are..." Steve said.

"They’re thirty miles behind the lines. Through some of the most heavily fortified territory in Europe. We’d lose more men than we’d save. I don’t expect you to understand that, because you are a chorus girl." Phillips said.

"I think I understand pretty well." Steve said, his jaw clenching.

Charlie couldn't help but find the tightening of his jaw to be sexy.  
  
"Then understand it somewhere else. If I read the posters right, you’ve got someplace to be in a half hour." Phillips said.  
  
"Yes, sir. I do." Steve said before he grabs Charlie's wrist and exits, taking one last look at the maps as he goes.

Phillips goes back to signing letters as he says to Peggy, "You got something to say now’s the time to keep it to yourself."

Peggy considers the situation.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Charlie is following Steve, allowing him to pull her after him until she comes to a sudden stop that made the blonde haired man lose his balance, which was funny given their new height difference.

Steve turned to look at her and asked, "What's wrong?"

"I know what you are going to do and I'm going with you."

"I don't kn-"

"Know what I am talking about." Charlie said then she smiled. "Steve, the ability to lift things with my mind isn't my only power."

"What do you mean?"

Charlie looked around before she dragged him behind a tent, she turned to face him and whispered, "Just don't freak out, Steve."

Steve opened his mouth to say something but Charlie covered his mouth with her fingers and projected her thoughts to him, _I can read minds and even influence people's thoughts and actions. It's hard to explain..._ but know that I haven't used this power on you." The Telepath added out loud as she lowered her hand.

He stares at her silently then he grabs her hands in his and asked, "You said you can influence people's thoughts?"

"Yes." Charlie said hesitantly.

"You're coming with me, there's no one I would have watching my back and helping me save Bucky than you. Your powers can help get us in without too much of a hassle but if gets too much for you then tell me and I'll think of something." 

Charlie silently stares at him, she could sense his emotions through the Mark. There was no falseness, he meant what he said. She beams at him and said, "I'll always be there."

Steve smiled before he released her hand but he kept her other hand in his and used his grip on it to pull her after him. 

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**U.S. CAMP, MAKESHIFT STAGE, BACKSTAGE - NIGHT**

Musicians hustle as Brandt's aide searches for Steve and Jessica.  
  
"Where the hell is Rogers and Anderson? Anyone seen them?" The aide asked, he grabs the three girls from the motorcycle number. "Get out there. Now! Stall!"

The first girl hurries to a shelf and grabs her “U” helmet. The second girls grabs her “S” helmet. The last girl reaches the shelf to find it empty. She looks around for her  
missing “A” helmet, "Where’s my helmet?"

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

A Silver Lookheed Electra cuts through the clouds.

The “A” helmet from the USO show sits on a bench, Charlie had been the one to grab it. Beside it, Steve buttons fatigues over his Cap shirt. Behind a curtain, Charlie was changing into her own fatigues in the makeshift changing area. At her feet in a careless ball was her outfit, she was buttoning up her fatigues. She pulled her hair back in a ponytail and   
  
"The Hydra camp is in Krausberg, tucked between two mountain ranges. It’s a factory of some kind." Peggy said, she is sitting across from him, studying a map.  
  
"We should be able to drop you right on the doorstep." Howard said as he leans back from the controls.  
  
"Just get us as close as you can." Steve said then to Peggy. "You know, you’re both going to be in a lot of trouble when you land.  
  
"And you’re not?" Peggy asked.  
  
"Yeah, but where I’m landing, if anybody yells at me, I get to shoot them." Steve said.  
  
"They’re undoubtedly going to shoot back." Peggy said.

He shows her his shield strapped to his back, "It’s got to be good for something."

Charlie raised an eyebrow and said, "Don't worry, Steve, I'm sure that it is..." She stepped out from behind the curtain.  
  
"Ms. Anderson, if you get out of this alive, I thought we’d stop in Lucerne for a late night fondue." Howard said with a grin.

Steve’s a little tweaked about Howard's flirting with her, Charlie sits next to Steve and stifles a smile when she sense his annoyance through the Mark. It was adorable, she had never had a guy care enough to get jealous over her, and that includes knowing what she was.  
  
"Why is he saying “fondue” like that? What’s fondue?" Steve asked.

Charlie just shrugs her shoulders and ignores Howard, she knew what fondue was but she didn't feel like addressing it.  
  
Peggy's quietly amused as she said, "Stark’s the best civilian pilot I’ve ever seen, and mad enough to brave this airspace. We’re lucky to have him."  
  
Steve eyed Peggy before he asked, "Do you, are you two...fondue?" Howard was a womanizer and Peggy was a pretty woman, he knew they weren't soulmates because they both had different Marks on their wrists.

Charlie's bore no such Mark, which was unheard of.  
  
Peggy ignored that question and said, all business as she hands him something, "Take this transponder. Activate it when you’re ready and the signal will lead us right to you."

Steve looks at the insignia STARK INDUSTRIES and asked, "You sure it works?"  
  
"It’s been tested more than you have." Howard said.

"No offense, Mr. Stark, but your little flying car didn't work for that long."

"Oooh, so cold, Ms. Anderson."

Charlie's quip drew a smirk from Steve.

The plane lurches to the left causing Charlie to fall against Steve, her body pressing against his completely. The two quickly pulled apart, fighting the blushes that were forming on their cheeks.

Peggy smiled at the sight.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Below on a mountain side, Anti-aircraft guns hammer the plane.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Howard executes evasive maneuvers. Steve straps on his parachute and throws open the jump door, Charlie quickly copies him and joins him at the door.

Thank God, she wasn't afraid of heights or jumping down from planes or tall buildings.   
  
"Rogers, get back here. We’re taking you all the way in!" Peggy shouted.

Explosions rock the air. Steve hesitates, realizing what he's about to do before he turns to Peggy, "ONCE WE'RE CLEAR, TURN THIS THING AROUND AND GET OUT OF HERE!"  
  
"YOU CAN’T GIVE ME ORDERS!" Peggy shouted back.  
  
"THE HELL I CAN’T!" Steve shouted, bracing in the doorway. "I’M A CAPTAIN!" The plane lurches once more just as Steve jumps, Charlie quickly follows after him.  
  
Peggy catches a glimpse of Steve’s and Charlie's chutes. She swears under her breath, then signals Howard, who hauls on the throttle.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Charlie looks up when Peggy's and Howard's thoughts slowly got further and further away from her sphere of mind reading. She unclips her parachute and let's it drop then using her telekinesis powers, she flies over to Steve and he does the same once Charlie had her arms under his arms. They had talked about doing this while they were sneaking around the camp, she had told him that she could use her powers to fly (she had smiled when she saw the gleam in his eyes). Charlie would have used her power on him completely, she had done it before with Peter and Ned but the difference between those two teenage boys and Steve was the fact that Steve was a man and her Soul Mate.

She wanted to feel him against her as she gently lowered them to the ground with her powers, shielding their landing.

Once they were safely on the ground, Charlie followed after Steve. She found it adorable that he wanted to protect her even though he knew she could protect herself with her powers.

Charlie had stopped bullets before but that had only been one robber and she could enter a trance-like state to heal her wounds but she didn't have a healing factor like Logan or Wade.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**HYDRA FACTORY - NIGHT**

Searchlights sweep from watchtowers, a barbed-wire fence rings a compound of buildings as a factory belches smoke.  
  
A Hydra tech loads blue cartridges into a cluster bomb, then gently loads the cluster bomb into a nose cone.  
  
"As you see, production is proceeding faultlessly." Zola said.

Zola and Schmidt walk the factory floor, catwalks radiate from the control room overhead.  
  
"Even in ordnance of this size." Zola continued to say.  
  
"Good. Increase output by sixty percent. See to it our other facilities do the same." Schmidt said.  
  
"But our...workers. I am not sure they have the strength." Zola said.

P.O.W.’s labor at gunpoint, a giant crane loads bombs onto a rail car.  
  
"Then use what strength they have left, Doctor. There are always more workers." Schmidt said.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Steve peers out at the guards patrolling the main gate, Charlie is standing next to him listening to the thoughts from the gates. They drops as headlights sweep the road. Three covered trucks rumble toward the gate. A gate guard checks the drivers’ papers. In the background, Steve and Charlie sneak into the last truck.

The trucks roll into the compound, gates closing behind them. Guards hurry out to unload the trucks.

At the last truck, one guard peers in, curious: a red, white and blue shield stands amongst the supplies. The shield springs out, smashing him in the face. The guard drops, Steve emerges from the darkness then he turns to help Charlie down, his hands were on her waist while her hands were on his shoulders for support. He puts her down in front of her and quickly removes his hand with a faint blush, she smiled at him and steps back.

"Nice move." Charlie said, impressed. "Next guard is mine."

"Deal." Steve said. "Now let's go."

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

HYDRA guards prod P.O.W.’s across the compound. Steve follows, keeping to the shadows. At the barracks, one guard stands watch as the other leads the prisoners inside.

Charlie holds up her hand to motion to Steve to remain where he is before she crept towards the guard and leaned against the wall, and said with a coy smile, "Hey, soldier, come here often?" The guard snapped his head towards her in surprise.

Before he could even open his mouth, she put her hand over his face not touching the skin just hovering over it and ordered, putting the suggestion in the guard's mind, "Sleep." He was weak minded so it was easy to invade his mind and alter it that way she wanted to.

The man leaned against the wall, pulling his helmet over his eyes and falling asleep.

Steve joined her and said, "Nice move."

She felt his awe and his impression through the Mark.

Charlie winked as she crossed her arms and cocked her hip, a smirk curling her lips, "If you liked that move, I have some others that'll really impress you."

Steve blushed at that before he cleared his throat and said, "Let's hid before his buddy comes out."

"Alright, Steve, led the way." Charlie said before she follows after him.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

A warder opens a cage and prods the prisoner in. A prisoner in a hat bring up the rear, slow. The warder hits him with a truncheon, knocking off his bowler. The prisoner picks up his hat and puts it back on. The man is named Dum Dum Dugan, he stares at the Warder as he said, "You know, Fritz, one of these days, I’m gonna get my own stick."

The warder viciously kicks Dugan inside. Down the row, a hundred more prisoners are trapped in a dozen more cages.

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

The guard steps out to find his partner sleeping against the wall, helmet over his eyes. He kicks him, but the guard doesn’t move. He lifts his partner’s helmet to see that he's out cold.

Steve steps up behind him with a truncheon. 

Charlie winces as he hits the man in the back of the head and catches him with her telekinesis power, she gently lowers him to the ground.

"Let's go." Steve whispered before he and Charlie enter the building. 

**+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Four prisoners, Falsworth, Jones, Dernier and Dugan slump on the floor of their cage, exhausted. The warder on the upper floor makes his rounds. He passes out of sight. Then the warder drops, unconscious. The prisoners jump up as Steve and Charlie looks down at them, Charlie is standing while Steve is crouched next to her.

"Hi." Steve said.

"Hello, boys." Charlie said with a smile and wave, she even winked for good measure.

The prisoners stare, stunned. The dame had to be the most prettiest one that they had ever seen and she was dressed like a soldier, and for some reason it didn't look weird on her at all.

Jones raises an eyebrow at Steve’s outfit and shield and asked, "And who the hell are you supposed to be?"  
  
"I’m...Captain America." Steve said.

"Oracle." Charlie said with a wink and wave.

The prisoners’ excitement dies.  
  
"Merde." Dernier said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Omg, Steve, you are so cute xD


	9. Oracle and the Howling Commandos

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Charlie is with the future members of the Howling Commandos and yes, they do see her use her powers but they promise not to tell.
> 
> Been thinking about giving Charlie a mutation that is similar to the Force...think about it, she could use Force Lighting and would literally call it that xD

**HYDRA FACTORY, BARRACKS**

The freed prisoners follow Steve and Charlie as they makes their way down the row, opening cages with the guards' keys in Steve's hand. Charlie had swiped it from the unconscious German and gave it to him. He releases Falsworth, Jones, Dernier and Dugan. Dugan spots a Japanese American soldier, Morita, already free.  
  
"What, are we taking everybody?" Dum Dum asked.  
  
"I’m from Fresno, Ace." Morita said.

Charlie rolled her eyes before she stepped really close to Dum Dum and said, jabbing her finger in his chest, "Listen up, pal, we're taking everyone expect for the Hydra soldiers because from what I can tell, he's one of us." She jerked her thumb towards Morita who was watching Dum Dum get torn down by a dame smaller than he was. "If you have a problem with that then you can take it up with me." Charlie gave all the men a look. "That goes for all of you."

The prisoners all stared at her in surprise and awe.

"I think I'm in love." Morita said.

"Who's the lucky jerk who has you as his soulmate?" Dum Dum asked.

"No one." Charlie said before she spun on her heel and went to Steve who was radiating sadness and amusement.

Sadness because he thought she didn't have a soulmate and she wasn't his and Bucky's soulmate. And amusement because he liked how she handled Dum Dum.

Steve searches the throng of prisoners, "Are there any others?"  
  
"They did take a number of the men to isolation ward. I’m afraid we haven’t seen them since." Falsworth said.

Steve considers this as the prisoners gather round. Finally, he hands them a pistol and grenades while Charlie liberated a rifle from the guard, checking to see that it had a full magazine, "The tree line’s northwest, about 80 yards from the gate. From there, just follow the creek bed." He turns to leave as he added. "I’ll meet you in the clearing with anybody I find inside."

"I'll go with them." Charlie offered, she knew what he was planning to do even without reading his mind. "They'll need me more than you do." She takes his hand and squeezes. "Just come back to me alive."

"I will." Steve said with a smile before he hugged her then he released her and turned to leave.

Charlie ignored the smirks and looks that she was getting from the men.

Jones stops him, "Wait. You sure you know what you’re doing?"  
  
"Sure. I’ve knocked out Adolf Hitler over 200 times." Steve said before he moves out.

Charlie counted in her head and as one, the prisoners all turned their heads to look at her, she raised her hands and said, "Long story, let's just get out of here, gentlemen."

"....So you're his girl?" Dum Dum asked, she wasn't surprised.

She had been expecting it, he had been thinking it for a while now.

"Let's focus getting out of here alive, Dum Dum." Charlie said as she shoved him forward. "Standing around here is just asking for us to get shot."

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Steve circles the factory, looking for a way in.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Charlie leads the men towards the entrance of the barracks, her rifle was pointed in front of her as she walked. Suddenly she stops and lowers her rifle before she hands it to Dum Dum who takes it from her, surprised.

"...Don't you need this?"

"Not really." She said, just as guards appeared in front of them. "Keep the rifle, I have something better." Charlie lifted her arm, palm facing up and fingers slightly curled.

And the guards raised up, she made a slashing motion and the HYDRA soldiers went flying, slamming into the wall.

She turned to face the surprised men who would make the Howling Commandos and said, "The other prisoners saw me throw a grenade at them."

"...What?" Morita said before he turned around to see that the prisoners weren't at all fazed at her ability, like they didn't see it and had only seen what she had told them.

Falsworth looked her up and down and asked, "Just what are you?"

"I'm human but I was born to read minds and use my mind to lift things among other things but I won't get into too much detail about them right now." Charlie said then she smiled. "Don't worry, gentlemen, I'll try not to eavesdrop on your thoughts. Just don't project them too loud for me to hear them, I don't want to be that close to you." Charlie gave Jones a playful wink who gave her a very sheepish smile.

"That Cap guy is one lucky bastard." Dum Dum said.

"Oui." Dernier said, in total agreement.

She smiled and motioned with her head, "Follow me, boys." The mutant turned around and led the men towards the entrance and where HYDRA kept some wicked looking large toys.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

A HYDRA guard stands watch near a door. He hears tapping. A silhouette appears behind the glass. The guard cautiously opens the door and pokes his head out.  
  
"Ja?"

The door slams, pinning his head. The guard looks up to see Steve’s fist coming right at him. Steve enters the factory, creeping between bombs and crates. Clusters of cartridges bristle inside an unfinished bomb. Steve pulls one out, curious, it glows blue in his hand. He pockets the cartridge and heads for the stairs.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Dugan slams a HYDRA guard into the grill of a half-truck while Charlie sent a group of them flying into a wall, making sure to keep the illusion that she was throwing grenades and fighting them with hand to hand combat. Dernier and Falsworth climb up top, Dernier climbs inside and settles behind the complicated-looking weapon.  
  
"Are you quite sure you know how to use that?" Falsworth asked.

Dernier peers at the grip. The cannon discharges, blowing a smoking hole in the factory wall.  
  
"Oui." Dernier said, awed.

"OhmyGod." Charlie said, awed as well.

HYDRA has such the coolest toys!!

She was totally in Science Fiction heaven!

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

On a monitor in the control room, the factory wall burns. Schmidt scans his security cameras, his eyes narrowing on the young woman who had sent his guards flying without even lying a hand on them.

How interesting...

He presses a button, sounding the alarm outside. At the controls behind him, Zola looks worried.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

A guard rushes down the stairs, his jackboots almost crushing Steve's fingers. Steve hangs under the staircase. Steve yanks the guard’s ankle. He tumbles down the stairs.  
  
Steve steps onto a catwalk, only to be met by another guard pointing a pistol. Steve knocks the gun from his hand and smashes him in the face. The guard falls, flips back up and charges. Steve swings from a beam and kicks the guard in the chest.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Dugan stares at the german controls, baffled. Just then, Jones slides into the passenger seat.  
  
"Not exactly a Buick." Dum Dum said.  
  
"That one. Zündung." Jones said, pointing.  
  
"You speak German?" Dum Dum asked.  
  
"Natürlich, natürlich spreche ich Deutsch." Jones said then adds off Dugan’s look. "Three semesters at Howard. Then I switched to French. Cuter girls."

Dugan pushes ZüNDUNG, the half-track roars to life, "I didn’t ask for a resume."  
  
Falsworth, Charlie and Dernier hang on as the half-track lurches forward.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Steve looks over the factory floor, taking in the full scale of the bomb-making facility. Just then two more soldiers attack from either side. The first guard fires. Steve drops and shoots him down. The second guard closes in. Steve whirls and crushes his neck with the side of his shield.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Schmidt surveys the uprising on his monitors. Outside, the guards struggle to fend off escaping POWs and the mysterious (and lovely) young woman who kept fling his men around like ragdolls though some had even opened fire on their own comrades. This woman was rising his interest in her more and more, with each action she does. Then he realized that he had seen her before with Captain America, in his movies. She was Charlie Anderson, the woman who sang the song but they called her Lady Liberty. He didn't like that name, it didn't seem to fit her at all. He really wanted to meet this woman now more so than before. Inside, a strangely-clad soldier takes on three guards. Schmidt adjusts his screen: Steve hits one guard, kicks another, then uses him to deflect the blast of a third. He studies Steve, impressed.  
  
"Doctor, prepare to evacuate." Schmidt said.  
  
"I’m sure our forces can handle--" Zola started to say.

Schmidt eyes Steve on the monitor, Steve dispatches the last guard and heads up the stairs.  
  
"Our forces are outmatched." Schmidt presses a button, alarms now blare inside the factory.

Zola hurries out of the room as Schmidt flicks the switches on a line of timers: SELBSTZERSTöRUNG. Each of them starts a countdown. Then he turns. The cube pulses in a cradle behind a smoked glass. He lowers a titanium case over the cradle. It retracts the cube plunging the interior of the factory into darkness.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

HYDRA guards fill the compound, taking on P.O.Ws and Charlie who rises a group of guards and slams them into each other before she throws them away.

Dum Dum whooped and shouted, "I'm totally falling in love with you, Oracle!"

The rest of the future Howling Commandos let's out cheers of agreement.

"Kill HYDRA!" Charlie snapped. "You can sing praises and love confessions about and to me after we get out of here alive!" But she was smiling at the end, she had never met other humans outside Aunt May, Peter and Ned that accepted everything about her.

Everything that made her Charlie James and she was happy but she still won't tell Steve or Bucky who she was, they weren't alive during her time (and even if they were, they'd be super old) but she didn't understand why she was born with their Soul Marks when they are both dead.

Was this a higher power's way of punishing her for being born a mutant?

The telepath shook her head as she throws another group of guards back with a push aka Force Push.

"Let's show these guys that we're not to be messed with!" Charlie shouted.

The P.O.Ws cheered at that.

Morita throws a grenade, blowing the guards away.  


**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Zola rifles through a filing cabinet in the corner of a tiled room. He gathers a sheaf of documents. A sketch of a TV-chested robotic suit. Beyond Zola, a shadowy figure lies slumped in a cage.  
  
Steve reaches the corridor, looking for more prisoners.

At the far end, Zola scurries out of his room, files pressed to his chest. Zola sees Steve. Steve advances. Zola runs the other way.  
  
Steve stalks inside, wary. Past the scattered files and specimen jars, he sees the large cage atop a rusty drain. A prisoner lies slumped against the bars and on hearing Steve’s footfalls, he calls out wearily, "Barnes, James Buchanan. Sergeant. 32557038."

Steve gapes, stunned. He can’t believe it, "Bucky?"

Silence. The prisoner doesn’t respond. Then he asked, "Who...who is that?"

Steve races to the cage, a beaten, grizzled Bucky Barnes staring out. Bucky squints, unable to focus.

He seems to have aged 10 years.  
  
"Is that..." Bucky trailed off.

Steve smashes off the lock and opens the cage door, he holds out his hand, grinning, "It’s me, Buck."

Bucky studies his friend’s face, "Steve?"  
  
"I thought you were dead." Steve said.  
  
"I thought you were smaller." Bucky said.

Steve gently helps him down from the cage. Buck gapes at his transformed, much taller friend.  
  
"What happened to you?" The dark haired man asked.  
  
"I joined the Army." Steve said. "So did Charlie, she's with the other prisoners."

"You left a pretty doll like her with those guys? And can she even fight?"

Steve smiled and said, "She can handle herself and she'll tell you when we met up, she's been worried about you." She thought she could hid it from him but Steve had seen her worried and fearful looks, she liked Bucky too.

That had made Steve happy because he knew that Bucky liked her way more than any other dame that his friend had dated.

"I would have written to her but I didn't have her address." Bucky said.

"She was busy performing with me. You should hear her sing, Bucky, she's got the voice of an angel." Steve said.

"You think she'll sing for me if I ask her?"

"Yeah, she does whenever I ask her to sing for me." Steve said.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

The first of the timers reaches zero, it beeps then one of the machines on the factory floor explodes.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Steve and Bucky stagger as the blast shakes the room. As they head out, Steve spots a huge map, featuring a series of HYDRA symbols spreading across Europe.  
  
Steve helps Bucky limp down the corridor as more bombs go off.  
  
"Did it hurt?" Bucky asked suddenly, now focused on his friend's new look.  
  
"Little bit." Steve answered.  
  
"Is it permanent?" Bucky asked.  
  
"So far." Steve answered.  
  
"You are going to get so many girls." Bucky said.

"There's only one girl for me."

"Charlie or our Soul Mate?"

Steve doesn't answer, he is conflicted about Charlie and the two mens' shared Soul Mate.

Charlie liked Steve before the serum but would his Soul Mate? God, how he once again wished that Charlie was his and Bucky's Soul Mate. She was perfect in everyway, at least to Steve.

And to Bucky as well when Jess and him started to develop a relationship, like how Steve and Charlie had done during the tour back at the states. The blonde haired man shook his head to clear his thoughts, he needed to get them both out of her alive and back to Charlie.

Bucky and Steve reach the stairs. They head down but another explosion blocks their way. They head back up, spotting a catwalk high above.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Morita leads a group of P.O.Ws toward the main gate, Charlie is right beside him. He hears something roaring up behind them, he looks over his shoulder.  
  
"DOWN!" Morita shouted.

He tackles Charlie and a P.O.W to the ground as a blue blast just clears their heads, blowing away the main gate. Behind the cannon, Dernier and Falsworth whoop, politely.

"OhmyGod, I was almost killed by friendly fire." Charlie muttered then louder as she moves out from under Morita's arm and sits up, glaring at the two men behind the cannon. "I'm going to kill you, Dernier! And you too, Falsworth!"

"Sorry!" The two men shouted back, in synced.

"Not as sorry as you are going to be when I get my hands on you." Charlie said as she stood up and helped Morita and the other man up. "Thanks, Morita."

"You're welcome." Morita said with a smile.

The P.O.Ws swarm the gate.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Steve and Bucky reach the catwalk only to find Schmidt on the other side, Zola waits behind him at the elevator.  
  
"Captain America. How exciting." Schmidt said, smiling. "I’m a fan of your films. And your lady friend has a wonderful singing voice, I could listen to her for hours." Schmidt hands the titanium box to Zola. He and Steve slowly walk forward, studying each other. "So the old man managed it after all. Not quite an improvement, but impressive."

Steve hits Schmidt in the jaw, sending him reeling as he said, "You’ve got no idea."

Schmidt straightens up, strangle pleased, "Don’t I?"

Schmidt swings, but Steve blocks it with his shield. Schmidt’s fist leaves a dent in the steel. Steve gapes, surprised. When he looks up, Schmidt hammers him. Steve goes down. Schmidt looms over him.  
  
Steve is stunned as he said, "Erskine said your experiment was a failure."

Steve kicks up, driving his feet into Schmidt’s jaw. Schmidt tumbles to the floor. Zola scrambles to the catwalk controls. A gap appears between Schmidt and Steve as both sides retract. Schmidt shoots a withering look at Zola. Zola pales. When Schmidt turns back to Steve, his face is askew and red skin bulges from torn seams.  
  
"A failure? Oh, no, Captain." Schmidt said as he gets to his feet. "I was his greatest success." He pulls, peeling his face from the bone, revealing a red skull underneath. He grins, hideous.

Steve stares in disbelief.  
  
"You don’t have one of those, do you?" Bucky gapes, then looks at Steve worriedly.

Steve shakes his head 'no', he kept his eyes on the other man across from them.

Red Skull tosses his mask away. Johann Schmidt's face wafts into the flame, staring up at it falls.  
  
"You’re a liar, Captain. You pretend to be a simple soldier. But in reality you’re just afraid to admit we’ve left humanity behind." Red Skull said as another explosion rock the floor below. "Unlike you, I embrace it proudly. Without the masquerade...without fear."  
  
"Then how come you’re running?" Steve asked.

Steve scowls from the end of the catwalk, helpless. Zola hands Red Skull back his titanium box. "Give my regards to your pretty and amazing friend, Captain. I look forward to seeing her in person as well, I feel that she can see things like I do." Red Skull said then the two of them step into the elevator and disappear.

Steve pulls Bucky away as explosions rock the catwalk, they spot a gantry above. He would worry about Red Skull's words about Charlie later, right now they needed to get out of here.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Zola eyes Skull’s exposed head, queasy. Finally, he looks away and notices the floor indicator.  
  
"Sir? We’re going to the roof?" Zola asked, Red Skull remains silent. The doors open, revealing a catwalk leading to a waiting triebflugel that was built for one. "But...what about me?"

Red Skull hands Zola a set of car keys, "Not a scratch, Doctor." Red Skull exits the elevator. Zola stares at the keys as the doors close.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Steve and Bucky reach the gantry. Bucky runs on. It creaks. Steve steps on.  
  
"Hurry." Steve said.

Carefully, Bucky limps across the gantry. Rivets fall.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

  
Morita leads the injured P.O.Ws toward the woods. Just then, something roars overhead. He looks up at the triebflugel, its rotating engines whirling into a blur.

Charlie looks up at well, her eyes narrowing before she looked away and said, "Keep moving!" 

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Red Skull glances out the cockpit, below his factory burns and he can just make out a car speeding down a lonely road.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Files slide on the seat as Zola speeds away, his feet barely reach the pedals.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Bucky jumps from the end of the gantry to the other side. Just then, another bomb explodes. The gantry collapses. Steve stands alone, trapped. Bucky looks around, frantic.  
  
"There's got to be a rope or something." Bucky said.

"JUST GET OUT!" Steve shouted.

The explosions come faster now.  
  
"Not without you." Bucky stated.

The roof around Steve falls in, he eyes the impossible gap.  
  
"Aw, hell." Steve said before he backs up, then races for the edge. Bucky’s eyes go wide as Steve leaps, sailing over the blazing chaos.

Just as the biggest bomb yet goes off.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Charlie is standing in the clearing, facing towards the ruined factory.

She could sense Steve's and Bucky's emotions through their Marks, she could feel Bucky's pain and Steve's relief so she knew that they were alive. And it was taking everything in her self-control resist the urge to drop the shield that she had put up between herself and her two Soul Mates.

Two figures broke out from the treeline and Charlie smiled widely before she ran towards them, laughing and waving her arms above her head like a lunatic. She could sense the amusement of the men behind her and before her. She didn't care about anything as she threw herself against them, her arms wrapping around their necks and pulling them down until their cheeks were pressed against hers.

Both men radiated amusement and surprise through their Marks as well as happiness and worry.

Bucky had honestly thought that Steve was just saying that she was here just to give him the will to get moving but he was telling the truth, she really was here.

And dressed like a soldier.

"Missed us, Doll?" Bucky asked as he wrapped his arm around her shoulders.

Steve cupped the back of her head and said, "I promised that I would return to you alive."

"Yes, you did." Charlie said with a laugh as she released the two men and pulled back, smiling then she realizes their audience and spins around. "Shows over! Get ready to leave!"

Dum Dum laughed, "Didn't think you are shy."

"Zip it you or your hat gets it."

The man walked away, laughing at her half-hearted threat.

Charlie shook her head before she turns towards the two men, who was radiating amusement through their hidden Marks, she looked at Steve and asked, "You still have the transponder that Peggy gave you?"

Steve reached into his jacket and pulled out the now ruined device, "It sort of got destroyed..."

"...I can see that." Charlie said before she takes it from him and looks it over. "Looks like we're walking back to camp. That should be fun." She hand it back to him.

"Are any of the men well enough to make that long journey?" Steve asked her.

Charlie looked over her shoulder at the men and said, "Oh yeah, they'll be able to make the journey back, you gave them back their freedom but we'll have to stop to rest."

Steve smiled before he did something surprising, he leaned down and kissed her cheek before he straightened and walked passed her.

"So you are his girl! His Charlie girl!" Dum Dum's voice said, breaking through Charlie's dazed and shocked fog.

"Hush you!" Charlie shouted, spinning to point at the smirking hat wearing man. "I thought I told you to get ready to move out!"

"Aye, aye ma'am." Dum Dum said as he gave her a flippant salute and wink.

Charlie shook her head and turned around to see that Bucky was staring at her. "Um...is there something on my face?"

"No, I'm just surprised to see you."

The mutant snapped her fingers and said, "I have to show you something...and tell you something, Steve and some of the soldiers already know." She raised her index finger to her lips, in a motion for silence before she looked down at a small rock that was between them and flicked the finger of her free hand up. 

The rock slowly rose until it was between their bodies, hidden from view still.

 _I can lift things with my mind and read the thoughts of others, even influence their actions and what they see_ , Charlie projected her thoughts to him then she lowered the rock. "But like I told Steve, I would never use my powers on you." She added outloud.

Bucky stared at her silently, she was starting to worry that she broke him until he suddenly wrapped his arms around her and lifted her up.

Charlie reflexively wrapped her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist as he spun around, laughing. "...Bucky?" She asked hesitantly.

OhmyGod, did she break him?!

Steve and the others handled it so well!

"You are so amazing." Bucky said. "Thank you for telling me and trusting me."

She shrugged and said, "Hard to lie to me but you're welcome...um...can you put me down, please?"

"Oh, sure...sorry." Bucky said as he put her down, Charlie released her hold on him and placed her feet on the ground.

"Or you can go somewhere private." 

"That's it, Dum Dum, I'll going to kill your hat!" Charlie shouted before she lunged towards Dum Dum who turned around and took off running, laughing.

The rest of the soldiers followed after them, laughing at the sight of such a large man running from a small woman.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Charlie plopped flat on her back on the ground, staring up at the sky, when they stopped for a rest.

It felt like they were walking for days but she knew that wasn't the case, and don't even her started on her poor feet.

Did she even have feet still?

She would look but that involved her moving and she didn't want to move at all.

Bucky's scruffy and handsome face appears in her line of sight, blocking her view of the sky.

"You okay?" He asked, concern and amusement in his tone and through his Mark.

"...Do I still have my feet?" Charlie asked. 

He raised his eyebrow and looked to where her feet was, not lingering at all around the chest area despite the fact that she had unbuttoned the top of her fatigues when she got too hot during the walk so you can see the swell of her cleavage.

He's a flirt with manners, who would have thought?

She mentally snickered when she remembered Steve's blushing face and averted eyes when he had seen her unbutton her shirt.

"You still have your feet, Doll."

"...I would throw my arms up and cheer but I'm much too tired for that."

Bucky laughed at that before he whispered, "You can't use your powers to fly?"

"Takes way too much energy." Charlie said. "I need to save it in case we absolutely need it."

The dark haired man hummed and sat down next to her, "Good idea...can I ask you something?"

"Go for it." 

"Why don't you have a Soul Mark?"

Charlie blinked in surprise before she slowly sits up, she needed to be upright for this conversation.

"Was born without one." The mutant lied, she shrugged her shoulders. "It's fine though. Do you have one?"

Bucky rolled up the right sleeve of his shirt and showed Charlie struggled not to react when she saw a very familiar shaped tattooed on the inside of his wrist.

OhmyGod, he has the first Death Star as his Soul Mark to represent her.

Ned and Peter would totally nerd out and then tease her for being such a Star Wars fangirl that her Soul Mates literally had it printed on their skin.

"That's a very interesting Mark." Charlie said. "I have a friend whose Soul Mark is a unicorn."

Ha! Take that, Peter!

"Really?" Bucky asked, amused.

"Oh yeah, I tease him about it all the time." Charlie said with a grin then she frowned. "Does Steve have one?"

"Yeah, same one as mine."

....How in the hell did she mess that? She saw him topless!

Well, in her defense she had been distracted by seeing a topless Steve both before and after the serum...

Must have not been paying that much attention, stupid hormones.

Charlie eyed him when she caught the tail end of his thoughts about his and Steve's shared Soul Mate, "Let's hope she's not a Morlock."

The look on Bucky's face when she said that was priceless, like he had been expecting her to say that or even like those sort of books!

"You read that?"

"Yeah, I love those kinds of books." Charlie said with a smile.

"I do too." Bucky said with the most adorable smile that she had ever seen on a man.

She smiled and leaned back, placing her hand behind her for support, "I always thought that time traveling would be cool." She still thought it was cool but damn, was it hard to not do anything to change the future.

"Yeah, I do too." Bucky said. "I want to know what the future will be like."

Charlie tilted her head to the side and said, "...Yeah, the future."

Bucky looked at her, noticing her sad look but just as he was going to open his mouth to ask her about it, he was stopped by Steve yelling for them to move out.

"You're killing me, Stevie!" Charlie groused.

"You want me to carry you?" Bucky asked.

The Telepath looked at him and said, "Nah, I'm good...I need the exercise." She stood up, wincing. 

"Here." Bucky offered her his arm. "We can help each other."

Charlie smiled and linked her arm through his, "I certainly can't say no when you word it like that."

"You seem like a stubborn dame."

"I'm not stubborn." Charlie said. "I just don't people to baby me just because I'm a girl."

Bucky placed his hand over hers, causing her to look up at him before he said, "Steve and I will never baby you because of that." He didn't go any further than that, to which she was grateful for because he and Steve only knew her as Charlie Anderson.

She regretted giving them a fake surname but she had panicked and told Steve the first surname that had popped into her head.

Oh well, she can't do anything about that but she also can't reveal too much of who she really is.

That would run the risk of changing the future.

Charlie was jolted from her thoughts when Steve appeared on her other side and offered his arm to her, she linked her arm through his.

...For now though, she will enjoy her time with her Mates until she returns to her time. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Decided to kind of write out the journey back to camp, hope you like it! I wanted to give her and Bucky some time to bond, he wasn't expecting her to like the same things he did!
> 
> 'Follow me, boys' is a Disney movie that had a very young Kurt Russell in it.
> 
> Anyone want to take a guess on who Peter's Soulmate is?


	10. Celebration

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, I'm debating between Judy Garland or Linda Eder as Charlie's singing voice and to be honest, Linda is winning that little war.
> 
> Have a listen, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2FlLfJpvCA
> 
> Before I go any further, I have to go back and add more mentions of Soul Mates and talks about those...for some reason, I don't go any further into it than I did in the first chapter. I'll let you know in the next chapter when I'm done.

**U.S. CAMP, PHILLIPS’ TENT - DAY**

Phillips stares out his window, stoic as he said, "Senator Brandt, I regret to report that Captain Steven G. Rogers went missing behind enemy lines on the 3rd of last week." He looks down to read the rough draft on his notepad, he’s dictating to the corporal. "Aerial reconnaissance has proven unfruitful. As a result, I must declare Captain Rogers killed in action." The corporal stops typing. Phillips turns to see Peggy is standing in the door, red-eyed and tired.  
  
"The last surveillance flier returned." She enters and lays down aerial pictures of the disintegrated HYDRA camp. "No sign of activity."

Phillips gazes at the photos. Then he looks to the corporal, "Corporal. Why don’t you go get a cup of coffee?" The corporal nods and leaves the room. "I can’t touch Stark. He’s a  
civilian...and the Army’s number one weapons contractor. You’re neither."

Peggy held up her head and said, "You’ll have my resignation in the morning." She felt the familiar burning behind her eyes but she refused to cry, she knew that she might never see Charlie again who the older woman had viewed as a daughter and knew that the girl had viewed her as a mother.

They had grown closer during the training camp.  
  
"I can probably make it so that you’ll avoid a court martial." Philips said.  
  
"With respect, sir, I don’t regret my actions. And I doubt Captain Rogers and Ms. Anderson did, either." Peggy stated.  
  
"What makes you think I give a damn about your opinions?" Philips snapped, Peggy goes cold. Phillips steps forward. "I took a chance on you, Agent Carter. Now that boy and girl-and a lot of other men-are dead, because you wanted to help those two and their romance."  
  
"It wasn't like that, I had faith." Peggy said.  
  
"Well, I hope that’s a great comfort to you when they shut this division down." Philips said, a commotion builds outside drew their attention away from each other. "What the hell’s going on out there?"

Soldiers ran by Phillips' window, he and Peggy move closer to look.  
  
Phillips and Peggy step outside to see dozens of soldiers hurrying toward the camp entrance. The soldiers part, revealing Steve, Charlie and Bucky walking up the road, hand in hand with the girl between them, leading a squad of P.O.Ws ragtag vehicles follow, carrying the rest. Steve’s uniform hangs filthy and torn, his shield is battered and bent but his head is high. Charlie had soot and dirt smudged on her face and neck, her uniform is dirty as well. G.I.’s cheer, more come running.

Hodge steps out of the barracks, drying his hair but he stops, stunned, "Rogers?"

Amazed, Phillips looks to Peggy, who wipes away tears. The stunned crowd parts, Steve salutes Phillips with his free hand before he and Bucky release Charlie's hands so they could salute as well though Charlie's was more casual than the two men's and said, "Colonel, some of these men need medical attention." Phillips looks at the gaunt faces of the men. He nods. Medics rush in to help the P.O.Ws. "I’d like to surrender myself for disciplinary action."

"I would too but technically I was a lab assistant." Charlie chimed in.

Struggling not to smile at Charlie's comment, Phillips looks at Steve's battered, burned shield and said, "That won’t be necessary."  
  
"Sir, I--" Steve started to say.  
  
"Just how many orders do you plan on disobeying, Captain?" Phillips asked.

Steve and Phillips lock eyes then Steve smiles and said, "Yes, sir."

Phillips turns to Peggy, smiling wryly, "Faith, huh?" He walks away as Steve turns to Peggy with Charlie who wore a sheepish smile, Peggy threw her arms around the younger woman and hugged her then she released her and pinned them both with a disapproving look, hands on her hips to complete the look.  
  
"You’re late." Peggy said.

Steve pulls out the Stark transponder, it's short to pieces as he said, "Sorry, couldn’t call my ride."

"Next time, give it to me, Peggy." Charlie said with a smile. "It would have lived longer with me than him."

Peggy gave a laugh as Steve and Bucky reached over and grabbed Charlie's hands, causing her to look down at their now joined hands before she first looked at Bucky then at Steve.

She missed the smile that appeared on Peggy's lips as the older woman took in their hand holding and the love that was shining in the two men's eyes. Something that she could tell that the younger woman doesn't see at all or refuses to see it.

Then the soldiers, including those who booed him at the USO show, crowd around slapping Steve on the back. They wave his comic book, yelling for Captain America. Steve smiles despite himself, finally accepted. 

Charlie beamed up at him, proud as she squeezed both of their hands.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**ALLIED HEADQUARTERS - DAY**

Barrage of balloons fly high over London, a newsstand in front of an imposing building flogs a paper: “CAPT. AMERICA TO RECEIVE MEDAL OF HONOR.”

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

A briefing room in an underground bunker.  
  
"The fourth one was in Poland, here, not far from the Baltic..." Steve said as Jessica and Peggy watches him sketch precis coordinates on a map, perfectly duplicating the one in the Hydra factory. Once again, Charlie was impressed by his drawing skills. "And the last was outside of Strasbourg, say thirty, forty miles west of the Maginot line." He looked up. "I only got a quick look."  
  
"Nobody’s perfect." Peggy said.

An aid picks up the map and carries it across the room. Steve, Charlie and Peggy turn as Howard approaches, a blue HYDRA cartridge in his hand.  
  
"Hey, aren’t you supposed to be picking up a medal right about now?" Howard asked.  
  
"I’m off the publicity circuit." Steve said.

Charlie smiled and said, "His fans will be crushed...so will the Senator for that matter."

Steve shot her a sheepish smile.

Just then, Phillips approaches from across the room, "Rogers, you just embarrassed a senior senator in front of a dozen reporters and ten members of Parliament." He hands Steve a medal. "You should get a medal just for that." Charlie laughed at that, amused, Phillips was starting to grow on her. Phillips sees the HYDRA cartridge. "You figure out what this is, yet?"  
  
"If you believe Rogers, it’s apparently the most powerful explosive known to man." Howard stated.  
  
Steve looked at Howard and raised an eyebrow, "If?"

Charlie crossed her arms over her chest and cocked a hip, giving Howard her best unimpressed look.  
  
"Well, either you’re wrong or Schmidt’s damn near rewritten the laws of physics." Howard said as he moves off toward his lab. "And I’m rather fond of the laws of physics..."

Phillips moves toward the room-sized map table, "These are all of Hydra’s factories."  
  
"The ones we know about. But Sgt. Barnes said Hydra shipped all the bombs to another facility. And that...wasn’t on the map." Steve said, turned towards him.

Phillips studies the map, deciding, then walks toward his office, "Agent Carter, coordinate with MI6. I want every Allied eyeball looking for that main Hydra base."  
  
Peggy looked at him and asked, "What about us?"  
  
"We’re going to light a fire under Johann Schmidt’s ass." Phillips said then to Steve. "What do you say, Rogers? It’s your map. Think you can wipe Hydra off it?"

Steve stares, finally given the responsibility he’s wanted, "I’m going to need a team."  
  
"We’ve already started lining up the best men...."  
  
"If you don’t mind, sir...so have I." Steve interrupted Phillips.

A wicked smirked curled Charlie's lips, she knew who he was thinking about without even looking into his mind. She is from the future after all...

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

"Surely you're not going out looking like that."

Charlie looked at Peggy over her shoulder, both women were in their shared hotel room. Peggy had insisted that they share one since she didn't want the younger woman to be in a room by herself, Charlie had been tempted to tell her that she had been planning to share a room with Steve and Bucky just to see the look on Peggy's face but she remembered what she had done to Hodges and kept that comment to herself. The older woman was staring at the younger one who was sitting on the bed and putting on her heels.

The mutant was wearing her uniform.

"...Is there something wrong with it?"

Peggy placed her hands on her hips and said, "Don't give me that, little lady, I saw the looks Barnes and Rogers were giving you on top of the fact that they held your hands in front of everyone! They love and adore you."

"I'm not their Soul Mate though." Charlie said as she looked away, telling the lie that she had been telling both herself and them since she had first gotten here.

"While it's frowned upon, Chosen Mates are allowed." Peggy said gently.

The younger woman shook her head and said, "I refuse to keep them from their Soul Mate, they'll have to find and be with her." She hated Chosen Mates, she had seen a mutant friend of hers get passed up for a Chosen Mate simply because of what she was.

And Charlie isn't perfect, no matter what Peggy, Steve or Bucky think. There's a darkness inside her.

She had taken revenge on the boy and his Chosen, she had made them see things that drove them into madness. Anyone else would feel (neither Xavier or Jean had liked what she had done but Erike approved and understood) bad but Charlie had only cared about her fellow mutants, Ned and the Parkers.

Now she had Peggy, Steve, Bucky and the Howling Commandos to add to that list.

Charlie will do anything to keep them safe, just not save them from their destined fates but she will prevent from dying before their assigned time. She doesn't mind killing to protect them, she had done it while she helped the prisoners escape.

And there's a fear deep inside her heart that for all their talk and actions, that Steve and Bucky will pass her up for a Chosen Mate as well. While she had told them that she could sense a lie, her telepathic powers can still be blocked.

Much like how the Jedi Mind tricked would not work on someone with a strong will, her powers worked similar to that.

Or something like that, Xavier had explained it to her once but she hadn't been paying attention because Wade had showed up and wanted her help.

That and Xavier tended to get long winded too whenever he tried to help her with her powers.

"Charlie..." Peggy said softly.

The mutant looked at her to find that she was now sitting next to her, she hadn't even realized it so deep in her thoughts she was.

The older woman placed a comforting hand on her shoulder and said, "You are very kind hearted, not many women would be willing to step aside and let two of the finest men go."

Charlie nudged the toe of her shoe against the rug and muttered, "I'm not that special..."

"Well, myself and two certain men think you are." Peggy said kindly. "And I am not letting you out there dressed like that."

The younger woman snapped her head in the other woman's direction, getting her thoughts now and paled but even without the ability to read minds, she would have known, "Oh, no...I am not getting dolled up." 

"Yes, you are."

"Nope." Charlie shot up to her feet and darted towards the living room.

"Get back here!" Peggy said as she too shot up to her feet and gave chase.

"You'll never take me alive!"

"Charlie!"

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**THE WHIP & FIDDLE PUB - NIGHT**

"Let me get this straight." Dum Dum said, Falsworth, Jones, Dernier, Morita, and Dugan lean on stools. Steve lines up at a dart board.  
  
"We barely got out of there alive and you want us to go back?" Jones asked.

Steve weighs a dart, then casually tosses a bullseye, "Pretty much."

The men look at each other for a long, pregnant moment.  
  
"Sounds rather a good time, actually." Falsworth said.  
  
"I’m in." Morita said.

Steve eyes Dernier, questioning. Dernier nods and said, "Je combattrai jusqu’à ce que le dernier de ces bâtards soit mort, chaîne ou bien qu’il pleure comme un nouveau-né!"  
  
Jones said, laughing, "J’espere touts les trois!" Dernier laughs, clapping Jones on the shoulder. When they look up, they see the others not understanding a word. "Oh, uh, we’re in."

Dum Dum finishes a beer, mustache covered in foam, "I’ll fight. Well, I’ll always fight. But you gotta do one thing for me."  
  
"What’s that?" Steve asked.

He hands over his empty pint glass, "Open a tab."

The others laugh and hand Steve theirs. Steve grins and takes the glasses back to the bar where Bucky waits.

Steve slides over the empties and asked, "Another round?"

The bartender looks impressed and asked, "Where are they putting all this?"

Steve shrugs and turns to Bucky.  
  
"That was the easiest battle of the war." Bucky stated.  
  
"What about you? You gonna follow Captain America into the jaws of death?" Steve asked.  
  
"Hell no. That little guy from Brooklyn who was too dumb to run away from a fight? I’m following him." Bucky nods at a tour of Captain America, PERFORMANCE CANCELLED - NOT TO BE RESCHEDULED. "But you’re keeping this outfit, right?"  
  
"Don’t get your hopes up. It’s not exactly regulation." Steve said.  
  
"I dunno. You saw those guys in Italy when you came back." Bucky said. "I don’t think they were cheering just for you."

The Invaders sing, arms wrapped drunkenly around one another. One by one, they stop as they notice Charlie and Peggy enter the bar. Both were out of uniform and both looked great though Charlie looked uncomfortable and ready to bolt, only Peggy's arm that was linked through hers kept her from bolting. It was obvious she wasn't used to being dolled up and dressed so nicely. Steve is the last to see them, it's only Bucky nudging him the ribs known to gently that he even looks.

Both men's jaws almost hit the floor at the sight of Charlie, yes she was beautiful in her normal wear but she looked even more beautiful dolled up.  
  
"Captain." Peggy said.  
  
Steve said, standing, "Agent Carter, Charlie."

"Ma'am, Doll." Bucky said.

Charlie meekly waved her hand at the two men, her cheeks turning red.  
  
"Howard’s got some equipment for you to try. Tomorrow morning?" Peggy asked.  
  
"That sounds fine." Steve said.

The Invaders start singing again, terribly.  
  
"I see your crack squad is prepping for duty. 08:00, Captain." Peggy said.  
  
"Yes ma’am. I’ll be there." Steve said.

Peggy smiled and gently pushed Charlie forward, saying, "You three have fun, I'll see you back at the room, Charlie."

Charlie watched Peggy leave her there with her mouth agape, Peggy was playing matchmaker despite what Charlie had told her! She was impressed, to be honest but still...

"You look nice."

She snapped her head to look at Steve, noticing that both him and Bucky were staring at her.

"Thank you..." She said. "Though Peggy deserves all the credit...despite the fact that she literally had to chase me down to do all this."

Bucky smiled and asked, "Don't like getting dolled up, Doll?"

"Not really, it's not my thing." Charlie said truthly, she smoothed the skirt of her dress out and picked off imagery lint. She then heard a very familiar song start to play, one that she always dances to.

Bucky grins when he saw her perk up at the song and nods at the dance floor, "You want to dance, Doll?"

Charlie smiled shyly, biting her lower lip before she nods her head.

"Then what are we waiting for? Let's go," Bucky said as he offered her his hand. "You got the next dance, Stevie."

"Yeah, I found the right partner." Steve said, smiling at Charlie who blushed and allowed Bucky to led her to the dance floor. The song that she and Bucky danced to was fast paced, she loved the music and the dance style of this era.

She had taken classes for it while she was younger and was very good at it, so she was able to keep up with Bucky.

By the time that the song had ended, they had drawn a crowd.

Charlie smiled and playfully bowed at the cheers and whistles before she walked over to Steve and grabbed his hand, "This next one is yours, don't worry, it'll be a slow one." She looked at the Invaders. "Don't worry, boys, you'll be able to dance with me as well."

They drunkenly cheered at that before she led Steve to the dance floor, she placed his hand on her waist while she placed her hand on his arm. She couldn't really reach his shoulder so she had to settle for his arm while she held his other hand. "We'll just sway side to side." Charlie said with a smile.

Steve smiled shyly and nodded his head before they started to sway to the beat of the song.

Charlie looked up at him and smiled, "Very good." 

Her eyes widen when Steve suddenly spun her away, keeping a firm hold on her hand before he spun her back to him with her back against his front. "You know how to dance..." Charlie said, stunned.

"Bucky taught me how to dance."

She pouted and said, "You made it sound like you didn't know how."

"I only said that I only danced with my mom and you or Peggy didn't ask any further than that."

Charlie laughed and said, "True enough."

Eventually the song came to an end and she then danced with the rest of the now formed Howling Commandos, she danced once again with Bucky and Steve, smiling and laughing.

She was enjoying herself with her mates and the Commandos, the mutant didn't want this night to never end...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Charlie's dress and make up, https://i.pinimg.com/564x/ba/0b/5e/ba0b5ea9dbcc9207aa32373946ce1ccb.jpg?b=t Peggy chased her around their shared apartment to put on her make up and do her hair xD
> 
> I also didn't want Charlie to seem too perfect, flawless, so I gave her a rarely seen dark side but it only comes out if you harmed her friends or her soulmates. Mutants do have it hard in the Marvel comics and I want it to affect and show her in personality.


	11. Calm Before the Storm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Edit: Changing Jessica to Charlotte but she goes by Charlie more, you call her Lottie and you will be punched.
> 
> Charlie and Bucky spend time together, he asks her about her father.
> 
> Her father, John is based on the appearance of Jason Statham :D Charlie suppresses her English accent a lot.
> 
> I'll back and add to this chapter, I'm not happy with it and I can't seem to find why lol but I edited the ones before it if you want to read those again.

**ALLIED HEADQUARTERS, STARK’S LAB - DAY**

Robot claws handle the cube cartridge inside a blast chamber. Outside, Howard examines it as his engineer takes notes.  
  
"Emission signature is unusual. Alpha, beta and gamma ray neutral. Though I doubt Rogers picked up on that." Howard said, he gently removes a glowing pellet. "Hmm. Looks harmless enough." Howard steers the robot claw, extending a sparking wire. "Hard to see what all the fuss is ab--" He touches the wire to the pellet. An explosion blows out the windows of the blast chamber and sends Howard slamming against the far wall. When the dust settles, Howard looks over at his engineer. "Write that down."  
  
The engineer writes it down.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Charlie stops what she was doing and looks over her shoulder frowning, at her side was Bucky.

"What's wrong, Doll?"

"...Nothing, I thought I felt a disturbance." Charlie said before she looked away, resisting the urge to add 'in the Force' to that.

She and Bucky were shopping, Steve had a meeting with Mr. Stark and couldn't come with them so it was just them.

"Something wrong with Stevie?"

Charlie gave him a peeved look, "What am I? Your 'Steve in trouble' radar?"

Bucky smirked at her and said, "No but you worry about him too so I know you are attuned to him and me."

"I worry because you two will drag me with you."

He chuckled and threw his arm over her, "Sure, Doll."

The mutant huffed at that before she smiled and linked her arm through his. "Come on, Sargeant, we have some shopping to do."

"Yes, ma'am." Bucky said as he allowed Charlie to led him.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**ALLIED HEADQUARTERS**

A pretty W.A.C., PVT. Lorraine, reads STARS & STRIPES that reads in bold black lettering P.O.W. CAMP LIBERATED, MIRACLE TREK ACROSS ENEMY LINES.  
  
"Excuse me, I was looking for Mr. Stark?"

Lorraine said, not looking up, "I think he went to look for a broom." She looks up. The real-life Steve stands over her. She slips into a smile. "Of course, you’re welcome to wait." Steve sits, hesitant. Lorraine swivels in her chair. He watches her legs cross but it doesn't send the same thrill through him when watching Charlie do the same thing. "I read about what you did."  
  
"Oh, I was just doing what needed to be done." Steve said.  
  
"Sounded like more than that. You saved nearly two hundred men." Lorraine said.  
  
"Really. It wasn’t a big thing." Steve said.  
  
"Tell that to their Soul Mates." Lorraine said.  
  
"I...don’t think they were all married." Steve said.  
  
"You’re a hero." Lorraine said.

Despite himself, Steve smiles.  
  
"Well, maybe. Depending on whose definition." Steve said.

"The women of America owe you their thanks." Lorraine said as she stands up, glancing around. "And seeing as they’re not here..." Steve's eyes go wide as she leans in and kisses him. He stiffens then gives in.

When they come up for air Peggy stands by the desk. Lorraine leaps back, flustered. Peggy just stares coldly.  
  
"Captain. We’re ready for you...if you’re not otherwise occupied." Peggy snapped before she stalks out of the door.  
  
Peggy clicks down the hall.

"Agent Carter. Wait a second." Steve called after her.

She doesn’t break stride. Steve catches up to her.  
  
"So was your feelings for Charlie a lie?" Peggy asked, not looking at Steve.

"I love her despite what you may be thinking right now."  
  
"I don’t think anything, Captain. Not one thing." She continues toward a metal door at the end of the hall. "You wanted to be a soldier. Now you are one. Just like all the rest. You should tell Charlie, she would like to know that your heart is so easily swayed by another pretty face. And I don't want her heart to be broken, she is a kind hearted girl and I'd hate to see her cry."

Steve stops, flustered and upset, "I do love her even though it's hard to know where I stand with her because she's hard to read."

Peggy whips around, cold, "You still don’t understand a bloody thing about women." She storms down a corridor. Steve watches her, at a loss.

"You're lucky that Charlie isn't here, I don't think you would have survived that with both of them angry at you." Steve turns to see that it was Howard that had spoken, the dark haired man stands in the now-open metal door.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Charlie stops once again and looks down at her bare wrist, the one that she knew held Steve's Mark. She could feel his fluster and upset, just what the hell is going on? The mutant was too far away to pick up his thoughts.

"You got your Soul Mark?"

She jolted in surprise and spun to see Bucky standing behind her, they were in a store.

"Oh no, it felt like something bit me." Charlie lied as she looked away from him.

"Why don't you have a Mark?"

"I thought I already told you?"

"You told me you were born without one but you don't seem bothered by it."

Charlie sighed as she walked over to him and linked her arm through his, they started to walk. "Where I am from, normal people don't treat people like me kindly." She explained, keeping it vague. "And normal people don't like being the soul mates of people like me."

"You look like a person to me." Bucky said with a frown, not understanding why she would be treated differently.

The mutant have him a sad smile and said, "I know but humans fear what they don't understand and they don't understand me. I have longed accepted that fact and the fact that I will never have a Soul Mate." She placed her hand on his bicep. "But let's not talk about that anymore, let's talk about something happier."

Bucky just nodded his head, frowning.

She sensed his unhappiness through his Mark but she said nothing and was grateful that he let the matter drop.

For now.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**ALLIED HEADQUARTERS, STARK’S LAB - DAY**

Howard leads Steve across his brand new lab.  
  
"Peggy sort of adopted Charlie as her daughter." Howard said, Stark's techs unwrap and install futuristic machines. "And it sounds like she thinks you’ve got more going for you than that." Workers replace the blast-shattered windows. Mechanics tuneup a motorcycle. "Just to clear the air, fondue is bread and cheese. Charlie is a pretty dame, she deserves to be taken out and showed off."  
  
"Really, I didn’t think--"

Howard interrupted Steve, "Nor should you, pal. The minute you think you know what’s in a woman’s head is the minute your goose is well and truly cooked." Howard stops Steve at collection of high-tech fabrics. "Me, I concentrate on work. Which at the moment is making sure you, Jess and your men don’t get killed." He unrolls an impressive gray metallic weave. "Carbon polymer. Ought to hold its own against your average German bayonet. Of course, Hydra’s not likely to come at you with a pocket knife..." He turns to Steve’s battered shield lying on a worktable. "I hear you’re sort of attached."

Steve fingers a bullet hole as he said, "It’s handier than you might think."  
  
"So’s the hotel chambermaid, but I wouldn’t take her into battle." Howard said, he pulls up a cart with a number of shields, some built, some half-finished. "I took the liberty of coming up with a few options." He picks one up. "This one’s fun. It’s fitted with transistorized relays."

Steve pulls out a plain, round shield from the bottom shelf. He spins it between his palms. It’s light, balanced. Steve pings the simple shield. It rings like a bell.  
  
Steve looked at Howard and asked, "What about this one?"  
  
"Oh, that’s just a prototype. Now this one-" Howard said, he picks up another shield after he placed the other one down.

"What’s it made of?" Steve asked.  
  
"Vibranium. Stronger than steel and a third of the weight." Howard said as Steve slides the shield onto his arm. "It’s completely vibration absorbent. Should make a bullet feel like a cotton ball."

Behind them, Peggy enters the lab.  
  
"How come it’s not standard issue?" Steve asked.  
  
"It’s the rarest metal on earth. You’re holding all we’ve got." Howard stated.

Peggy reaches them, icy as she asked, "Are you about finished, Mr. Stark? I’m sure the Captain has some unfinished business."

Steve smiles. She doesn’t. He lifts the shield and asked, "What do you think?"

Peggy looks at him, expressionless. Then she turns to a table of guns, picks one up and fires at Steve's chest. He blocks, the slugs flatten and plink to the ground. The woman lowers the gun and said, "I think it works." She puts the gun down and stalks out of the room. Steve and Howard watch her go for a long moment.  
  
"About my and Charlie's uniforms..." Steve said, he hands Howard a sketch. Neither takes his eyes of Peggy, Steve was afraid that she'll return to finish the job. "I had some ideas."  
  
"Whatever you want, sport." Howard said.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

"So can you tell me about your parents?"

Charlie was looking at a coat but at his question, she looked at him and said, lowering it, "That's something also sad."

"I'd understand if you don't want answer that." Bucky said.

"It's fine, my mother was murdered when I was a child and my father raised me until I was taken away and given another family to raise." Charlie said as she puts the coat down.

"I'm sorry to hear about your mother." He said. "But why were you taken from your father?"

Charlie looked at him and simply raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, because of your powers?" 

"Yes." The mutant said as she looked away. "I still talk to my father though so there's a connection." She suddenly stopped walking, now picking up on Steve's thoughts. Charlie frowned, she wasn't supposed to be able to do that but then she recognized the scenery outside the store, they were near the base so she was now able to hear Steve. The mutant was probably distracted by Bucky's question about her parents.

"What's wrong?"

She sensed his worry, she heard his silent question of why she had suddenly stopped.

"Steve wants us to return, to try on our new uniforms." Charlie said softly, not wanting the people around them to hear. She had done it when she was talking to Bucky earlier about why she _didn't_ have a Mark.

"I hope he kept that uniform." Bucky said.

"You and me both, Bucky." Charlie said before she pulled him out of the store and headed back to the base. She was eager to see the uniform that was made for her, Steve had been very secretive about it and had somehow blocked her from reading his mind.

She had been both impressed and surprised by that but to be honest, she did like surprises especially from those she cared about and protected. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Peggy has Charlie's back xD
> 
> And the conversations between Charlie and Bucky got all sadish.


	12. Captain America and the Howling Commandos

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had fun writing this chapter! 
> 
> This is Charlie's new costume btw, https://i.pinimg.com/564x/45/51/3f/45513f5b3d1b20b265d3d25d20237a56.jpg but the belt and guns fit the WWII era.
> 
> The thing she did with his shield will be their little combo technique.
> 
> Just a head's up, since I don't want to put an author's note down as a chapter, Most People Are Good is getting a reboot as well as the rest of the Hunter family stories. The new story will be called Rewrite the Stars and that's about all I am sharing with you lol I won't delete the ones that I have now since I am sure you'd want to read those.

Charlie finished putting her skirt belt on (she silently geeked out when she first saw it, it was a _kama_!), she smiled as she looked at her reflection in the full length mirror. The costume hugged her body, clinging to her curves.

Well, you can definitely see that she's a girl. She normal wore men's T-shirts that were loose on her so it hid the fact that Charlie had...curves.

Wade would bluntly say that she had the body that could rival Marilyn Monroe's, Charlie had an hourglass figure but it wasn't extreme like Monroe's.

She's just happy that she had the skirt belt to cover her butt because according to Wade, Charlie had an ass that was made to worn by jeans.

Charlie opened the door and stepped out, and everything seemed to stop as soon as she closed the door behind her and turned around.

Looking up, she saw the Steve, Bucky and the Howling Commandos were all staring at her with their mouth hanging open.

"What?" Charlie asked, she looked down. "Does it look bad on me?" She took in all of their costumes as they seemed to gather themselves, Bucky's and Steve's being her favorites.

"Oh no," Dum Dum said, being the first to break the silence. "You look good in it but who was the one who designed it? I want to thank him."

Charlie stifled a smile when she felt and heard Steve's embarrassment, he hadn't realized that Howard would have made it that form fitting.

"I designed it." Steve said. "But Howard was the one who made the costumes." 

"Stark should get a medal." Jones said.

Charlie laughed and said, "No, he doesn't but be sure to let him know that you approve."

"Charlie girl will be causing Hydra to throw their weapons at her feet." Morita said.

Bucky cleared his throat and said, "Did Howard have to make it that tight?" Charlie felt both his and Steve's jealousy, it was adorable and flattering.

"Let's just get to the first target, boys." Charlie said. "And as for the outfit, it's fine. I like it." She smiled at Steve who blushed.

"Alright," Steve said, getting into a leader role. "The first target is in France."

France, uh? That should be fun, she always wanted to go there. Too bad it was during a war...

**++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**HYDRA FACTORY, FRANCE**

Charlie peered out from behind a boulder before she slowly crept backwards and looked at Steve.

"There's guards posted outside the front gate." Charlie said. "They don't know that we're here but we have two options."

"Oh yeah? What's that, Charlie girl." Bucky asked.

She held up two fingers and counted off her options, "Option one is that I hide us with my powers and option two is I don't and we just go through the gate like we own the place."

Charlie paused, picking up their thoughts then she smiled and shook her head, "I have no idea why I even said that."

"Your talking crazy, Charlie girl." Dugan said with a smirk.

The mutant shook her head before she used her powers to fly into the air, "Hush you and get ready to cause some havoc, boys." She then shots forward, towards the front gate and she thrusts her hand forward then she makes a savage pulling back motion. The gate was torn off, smacking into the soldiers standing in front of it.

A quick glance behind her showed that Steve and the Howling Commandos were right behind her, just below her. She looked away, Charlie came to hover above a group of Hydra soldiers and raised them off the ground then she threw them away with a wave of her hand.

The mutant flew towards the factory, with her boys right below her.

Charlie thrust her hand forward and the door crashes open, Steve enters firing a tommy gun while bullets ping off his red, white and blue vibranium shield.

The Invaders pour in behind him, blasting away.

Charlie zooms over them, she uses her powers to lift a group of Hydra soldiers before she throws them against the back wall behind them. Steve throws his shield, hitting the Hydra soldiers in front of him but Charlie raised her hand and concentrated her powers on the vibranium shield. The mutant moved the shield further than it would have gone, taking out the entire platoon of Hydra.

The Invaders, Bucky and Steve all stared, gaping before as one they all looked up at Charlie.

"Was that you?" Dugan asked.

"It was both Stevie and me." Charlie said with a grin. "He threw the shield, I just helped it move further along." 

Steve smiled and said, "Thanks, Charlie."

Charlie touched her finger to her brow in a casual salute before she flew further into the factory, "You can stand there in awe of my prowess after we destroy this factory."

The Invaders follow after her with Steve and Bucky leading the way.

The mutant landed in front of a Hydra soldier and punched him in the front before she sent him flying, she felt malicious intent aimed at someone close to her and when she looked she saw that a Hydra soldier was aiming a gun as Morita who hasn't noticed that danger. Charlie reacted on instinct, she ran towards Morita and shoved him down. As they were both falling with Charlie on top, the telepath heard a gunshot and then a stinging pain along her rear.

Both Charlie and Morita hit the ground with a grunt just as she heard something whizz over them, she heard a thud and a pained grunt. Looking over she sees Steve's shield fly over a downed soldier.

"Charlie girl, are you okay?!" Bucky shouted, she could sense both his and Steve's worry through their respected Marks.

Charlie rolled off of Morita then rolled onto her front when the pressure sent a wave of stinging pain through her rear, "Ow, ow, ow...what the hell? Did I get shot in the rear?"

Dugan's chuckle sounded over her head, "It grazed you, you're lucky it was a normal bullet."

"Oh, I'm so happy about that." Charlie said sarcastically.

"Thanks for taking a bullet for me, Charlie."

"And that'll be the last bullet I take for any of you boys." The mutant quipped before she carefully gets onto her feet, wincing as she did so. "Looks like, I'll be flying from now on..."

"Shouldn't you get that looked at?"

Charlie looked at Steve who as asked the question, she smirked (Steve instantly regretted asking her when he saw that smirk, which he knew she heard because said smirk grew wider) and placed her hands on her hips, "You offering to look at later?" 

Bucky stifled a laugh as did the Invaders, turning the laughs into either violent sneezes or coughs.

Steve tensed and blushed, "...No, I just don't want it to get infected."

The mutant just smiled at that before she took to the air and said instead, "Let's get this factory in non working order, shall we?" She shot forward with a smile still on her face.

Bucky looked at Steve and said, "....She's really something, eh?"

"....Yeah, just not when she's teasing me." Steve said with a sigh.

Dugan laughed and said, "You two are lucky bastards." 

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**ALLIED HEADQUARTERS, BRIEFING ROOM**

Peggy replaces an X with an SSR flag on the Hydra map.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**HYDRA FACTORY, BELGIUM**

"So let me get this straight, Charlie girl," Dugan said. "You can make them think the back of this here truck is empty and that someone is driving it but it would really be you using your powers to drive and shield us from their view?"

Charlie placed a hand on her hip as she cocked out the hip that had said hand on it, "Exactly right, Dum Dum." She raised her other hand and taped her index finger to her temple. "Brute strength is nice but personally, I like to use my brain." Then she shoved Dugan towards the back of the truck. "Get in there, that factory won't destroy itself."

"You such a bossy little thing." Dugan said with a smile as he allowed Charlie to push him up and into the back of the canvas covered truck.

The telepath looked at the other men and said, "What? You waiting for an invitation? Get in."

"Dum Dum is right, you are a bossy little thing." Jones said.

"Making a comments about my height is not a way to get me to like you, Jones." Charlie deadpanned.

Falsworth laughed at that as he climbed into the truck, "She told you, Jones."

Jones just shrugged his shoulders with a smile before he climbed in, followed by Morita and Dernier.

"You sure you will be fine?" Steve asked as he stopped next to her, Bucky was behind him. They were both raditing concern.

"Of course, it won't put too much of a strain on my powers." Charlie said with a shrug, she's done it before with Wade.

Steve gave her a quick hug before he climbed in as did Bucky, Charlie stood there dumbly for a second before she snapped out of it and climbed into the back. She closed the back before she stood in front of the tiny window in the back of the bed so she could see where she is going.

She conquered up a Hydra soldier who 'started' the truck and drove it towards the gate, she slowed the truck down and projected her thoughts to the men. _Keep silent and don't move._

There was no negative reaction to her voice in their heads, she had told them when they had first started to do this that it was easier to communicate this way when they needed to be silent.

And they had gotten used to hearing her voice in their heads.

Charlie stopped the truck in front of the gate and the 'driver' rolled down the window, poking his head out and speaking to the guards in German. 

She had Jones teach her some German beforehand in case she would ever use her powers like this.

It always helped to be prepared for just about anything.

Two of the guards went to check the back and cleared it, closing it up and waving the truck through. Charlie turned the truck back on and drove it through the now open gate, once they were in she dropped the illusion and turned off the truck.

"Go get'em, boys." Charlie said before she thrusted her hand forward and the back of the truck blew off, her boys opened fire on the surprised Hydra men as soon as she did it. Charlie flew out of the truck, pushing a platoon of Hydra soldiers with a well placed and strong Telekinesis push. It had sent the men flying back and hitting against the parked fast-tracks with a painful sounding crack. She flew above her boys, causing things to explode when she slammed vehicles together and causing them to explode. The explosion had caught the men that were standing close by.

Below her, Steve and the Invaders fan out across the blazing battleground, wreaking havoc.

Charlie raised two Hydra fast-tracks into the air as she walked then she made a clapping motion and slammed them together, crushing them into one large metal ball before she releases them. She raised her hand and tore off the large doors of the factory, she threw the doors at a platoon of Hydra soldiers and knocked them down. All the while she didn't falter in her walk, her skirt belt flaring out and moving with the sway of her hips.

The mutant started to run then she leapt into the air and flew inside the factory, making a slashing motion and slamming everything into the walls and sometimes even through them.

"Leave some of the fun for us, Charlie girl!" Dugan shouted as he and the others ran in.

Charlie laughed and shouted back, "Then don't fall behind!"

The man laughed at that, she sensed his amusement, he and Charlie had developed an odd friendship. She had gotten close to all of the Invaders, it was hard not to form that bond because of the fact that she had also helped saved them and fought alongside them. Charlie had even taken a bullet in the butt for Morita, actually it just grazed her but it had been hard to sit down afterwards.

Morita had been the one to provide medical care to her afterwards since Steve turned into a blushing mess as soon as Charlie made a motion for her zipper and Bucky probably would have turned it into something more.

She knew Bucky was sexually attracted to her, as was Steve but the man with the plan was too shy and inexperienced to do anything about it. Charlie was tempted but she really didn't want to lose her V-card during a war or in a time not her own.

Charlie also didn't know what would it do to her powers, with her luck her little mind trick would drop and reveal that she was their soulmate.

The mutant felt a warning and she dodged a blast that zoomed passed her, by doing a barrel roll. She looked behind to see the blast disteragrate a wall, she let out a whistle at that.

That would have made her day bad. 

She looked up, eyeing the fast-track before she thrusted her hand out and sent it flying through a wall. Charlie curled her fingers, crushing the fast-truck. She normally would have called that move Force Crush but since Star Wars wasn't even thought of or the creator to her beloved series wasn't even born yet, she was keeping such nerdy comments to herself.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

Red Skull roars up to the ruined factory in his car.

He glares at the destruction as his windshield reflects the flames.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**HYDRA FACTORY, POLAND**

Through a sniper scope, Steve stalks a bombed-out factory.  
  
The scope whips to see a Hydra gunman aiming at Steve. The sniper falls. Steve clocks it and gives the thumbs up.

Bucky grins behind the gun.

"Nice shot, Bucky." 

He looked to his left, Charlie was sitting on ground next to her, "Thanks, Doll, but you should be down there and backing Stevie up." 

"Yes, Sergeant Barnes." Charlie said as she gave him a casual salute before she takes to the air and flies towards Steve. 

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**ALLIED HEADQUARTERS, BRIEFING ROOM**

Peggy replaces another X with an SSR flag. She looks down to the next X, somewhere in Poland.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**HYDRA FACTORY, CZECHOSLOVAKIA**

The Invaders scramble out the side doors of a Hydra factory, Charlie flies over them. They dive for cover and wait, she lands next to Dugan and clenches the hand that was Marked with Steve's star. He was still alive but where the hell is Steve?

And where was that explosion?

They peered out from behind their respected covers.

Then Steve crashes through a factory window on his motorcycle, the factory behind him explodes. He hits the ground, roaring towards Bucky, Carlie and the Invaders. "He's such a show off..." Charlie said with a shake of her head, smiling.

"He cut that pretty close." Dugan said.

"Next time any of you tell me that I'm reckless, I will bring this up." The mutant said.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**FROZEN WOODS**

The woods stand white and silent then six white figures rise out of the snow like ghosts.

The Invaders shake off the snow and creep forward. Then a seventh figure rises: Steve in full red, white and blue. A rifle cracks, a bullet pings off his shield.

Steve spins and hurls his shield, a Hydra sniper falls out of a far tree.

The Invaders gape.

Charlie lowers herself to the ground next to the downed sniper and looked down at him, toeing him with her boot before she looked at Steve and said, "Nice move."

"Thanks, how was the patrol?" Steve asked.

"Oh, just the usual setting," Charlie said. "A lot of guards guarding a factory, as if that'll stop us. It looks like Skull doesn't want us to destroy this one, must have finally gotten tired of us destroying the previous ones."

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**ALLIED HEADQUARTERS, BRIEFING ROOM**

Peggy drops a Hydra flag into a box and picks up an SSR flag.

She sticks it in the map.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**HYDRA FACTORY**

Steve and Jones ride in the back of a jeep as Dugan drives away from the burning factory. A Hydra fighter plane swoops over them, guns blazing. Steve blocks with his shield as Jones opens up his .30 CAL.

The plane bears down, Jones stitches it up the middle. It catches fire, spins out of control and crashes ahead of them.

Dugan slows to a stop. The three of them stare, impressed.

"Excuse me!" Charlie shouted as she shot over them with a Hydra fighter plane right behind her, she was flying and was literally having an aerial dog fight with a plane. Only during WWII could this happen.

The telepath was dodging the shots fired at her, she raised destroyed fast-tracks to block the shots then she raised a massive slab of wrecked metal and threw it towards the plane. She heard the pilot's panicked thoughts before it stopped when the plane slammed into the slab, exploding in a ball of fire and shrapnel.

She erected a shield around her so she wouldn't get cut, she dropped her shield then flew down towards the jeep. "Nice shot, Jones."

"Nice move, Charlie girl."

Charlie landed in the passenger's seat and said, "Thanks but I never want to do that again, that's a lot harder than it looks." She looked at Dugan. "Let's get out of here before more come to avenge their friends."

"...Good idea." Dugan said before he drove off.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**FOREST - DAY**

Dernier runs through the woods, a bomb tucked under his arm.

Parallel to him is a Hydra fast-track that is racing along a road.

Dernier rolls under the fast-track, he magnets the bomb to the bottom of the vehicle as it roars over him. He jumps to his feet in time to see the fast-track explode, he wasn't flinch when he sees shrapnel flying towards him. The deadly metal shards bounced off an invisible shield, standing behind him was Charlie was had her hand out.

"I would really appreciate if you boys didn't get too cocky with the fact that I can and will shield you." Charlie said.

Dernier smiled at her.

The mutant just shook her head, "Let's go met up with the others." She raised Dernier and herself in the air, flying towards where they had left the rest of their group.

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**BATTLEFIELD - DAY**

The Invaders race across a field as the landkreuzer bears down on them. They’re almost to safety when Dugan's hat flies off his head, landing in the path of the oncoming tank.

Dugan runs back for it while the rest of the men shout, "Stop! Charlie girl could get it."

Dugan dives, grabbing the bowler and rolling out of the way. He wedges the hat on his head, smug. Then he realizes the tank has turned and is coming right at him.

Then, from nowhere, Steve dives over Dugan and grabs the tank's cannon barrel. He flips himself into the air and lands atop the turret. Steve spots a glowing energy housing, marked: EXPLOSIVE! He raises his shield high and brings it down. The tanks grinds to a halt.

Steve raises the shield again. The house crackles and sparks fly. Steve brings the shield down one last time. An ominous drone begins to rise. Steve takes a running leap off the tails as the tank explodes.

Charlie zooms out of the sky above him and catches him, raising Dugan into the air as well without even looking at him, her arms going under his and she takes him (and Dugan) to where the others were waiting. 

She lowers Dugan down to the ground first then she puts down Steve, her feet barely touches the ground before she is walking towards Dugan. "Next time let me get the damn hat." She said, reaching up to flick at said bowler. "Okay?"

"Yes, ma'am." Dugan said, he and the others quickly learned that Charlie wasn't pleasant to be around when she is angry so it was always in their best interest to go with whatever she says.

Her anger means she cares about their safety

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**ALLIED HEADQUARTERS, BRIEFING ROOM**

Peggy and Phillips watching the footage.

The camera moves past Falsworth and Dernier drinking from their canteens. Dugan drinks from a flask with Charlie at his side, drinking from her own. She notices the camera and waves at it with a grin.

Bucky and Steve survey a valley. 

**++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++**

**HYDRA FACTORY, GREECE - NIGHT**

"YOU ARE FAILING!" The Red Skull shouted, Zola cringes before him. Around them, Hydra troops search the rubble of another burned factory. "We are close to an offensive that will shake the planet, Doctor. Yet we are continually delayed because you can’t outwit a simpleton with a shield!"  
  
Zola gestures at the devastated facility, "Sir, this is hardly my area of expertise. I merely develop the weapons, I cannot fire them." A beat. "And the Allies did not take this installation easily. Your troops fought to the death."  
  
"And now they are dead. I trust you see the problem." Red Skull said. "Finish your mission, Doctor. Before the American finishes his." He puts his hands on either side of Zola’s head, squeezing a little, bringing their faces close. "You have done great things. Do this one more."

Zola contemplates his task.  
  
A Hydra soldier shouted, "Sir!"

The troops haul the injured plant Manager, Velt, from the rubble. Skull bids them forward.  
  
"We fought to the last man..." Velt said.

Zola cringes as Skull pulls his Luger.  
  
"Very nearly." Red Skull said.

Zola turns away, his face illuminated briefly by an inevitable flash of blue light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried to length it and add to this scene but as always, I will add more to it when I think about more or when one of you makes a suggestion.
> 
> We all know what happens in the next chapter :(
> 
> Remember that the Invaders had see them hug, had seen Steve kiss Charlie on the cheek and even hold hands with Charlie in the middle.
> 
> Also for their reunion in Charlie's time, how should it go down? Should it happen before or during the Battle in New York?

**Author's Note:**

> I aged up Ned, Peter and Charlie. They are now 17 in the first Avenger movie, Peter had been Spiderman for a while now and hadn't been noticed by Tony yet...thanks to Charlie.


End file.
